College of Western Idaho (CWI) hosted its Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program once again this spring, providing CWI students an opportunity to gain valuable real-world experience while giving back to the community. More than 10 CWI students and graduates took part in the volunteer program hosted at CWI’s Nampa Campus Academic Building and Ada County Campus Pintail Center. This year volunteers helped prepare just under 200 individual income tax returns over three months. The service provided a savings of more than $48,000, based on average return rate calculated by the Internal Revenue Service.
The program was led by Assistant Professor of Accounting, Joe Welker, and Instructor of Business and Information Technology, Michel Boldt. Student participants included Lisa Farnam, Bryan Smith, Christopher Henderson, Wade Aldridge, Marcie Pyorie, Crystal Hammer, Sarin Jensen, and Syd Dietrich.