From professional to pupil: Demystifying tax education in De La Salle University’s BS Accountancy Program through students’ perceived professional skills and practitioners’ experience

• Main Authors: Chua, Dominique Letisha Yu, Martirez, Erika Isabel Virginia Santos, Tangco, Mikaela Joan De Guzman, Tria, Alaina Carlize Centeno
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 2023
• Subjects: Taxation—Study and teaching; Accounting; Curriculum and Instruction; Education; Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research; Taxation
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etdb_acc/84; https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/context/etdb_acc/article/1114/viewcontent/From_professional_t_essional_to_pupil_Demystifying_tax_education_in_De_La_o_pupil_Demystifying_tax_education_in_De_La.pdf
• Institution: De La Salle University

The accounting and tax professions are no longer limited to the services they once were, thus changing the way it must be taught and learned to incoming professionals to keep the industry cycle afloat. This study aimed to get a dual-perspective view; deducing from the student perspective whether tax education has an effect on students’ perceptions on their professional skills in accordance with IES 3 – Professional Skills, as well as the professionals’ perspective on what incoming professionals need to survive, thrive, and progress within the tax profession. The study employed a convergent parallel mixed method approach, where a survey was conducted among DLSU students and interviews were held with tax professionals from the five (5) roles in the taxation system: private tax practitioners or advisors, internal accountants, tax litigators, government accountants, and members of the academe (educators, lecturers). Quantitative results were drawn through descriptive statistics and Somers’ Delta, while qualitative results analyzed through thematic analysis. Combined, they were subjected to mixed-method integration. Key findings of the study were that there is an overall significant relationship between tax education and perceptions on students’ professional skills regardless of having external tax experience, as well as a description of what skills were found important in the professionals’ experience through their careers and what is sought out by professionals from new hires and staffs. Further comparisons were also done to assess the difference of the DLSU BSA students’ current state of knowledge and skills, suggesting that changes be effected to the current work-integrated learning implemented, accompanied by safeguards, warnings, and tips for implementation. The researchers concluded that education has a direct impact on perceived professional skills, thus requiring a more informed and updated tax curricula, catered to student-centered learning, to mold a new generation of accountants prepared for the everchanging tax environment and climate.