INDIVIDUAL INCOME TAX ACCT 145 ON-LINE

Mike Deschamps

mdeschamps@miracosta.edu

Welcome to ACCT 145, Individual Income Tax On-line at MiraCosta College. My name is Mike Deschamps and I am the instructor for the course. I am a CPA and an Enrolled Agent and have been teaching full-time in the community college arena for 14 years, the last five here at MiraCosta. I have been teaching in total over 20 years and taxation is absolutely one of my favorite classes to teach.

I think that one of the most important things that students must realize when taking an on-line class is the degree of effort and self-motivation that is required. Quite frankly, I think that taking any accounting class on-line is more difficult than in person, because of the visual nature of the material and the inability of the instructor to “look in your eyes” and see if you are getting the material. The burden of translating the material and, also communicating any difficulties that you are having with it, falls squarely on you and I think that is one of things that makes on-line learning so challenging. So, if you are taking this class because you think it will “easier” than taking it “live”, trust me when I tell you that it not the case.

Having said that, my goal is to make this class as interesting and rewarding as possible. Tax issues affect all of us on a daily basis and whether you are taking this class to begin a career in tax, or simply want to be able to better understand your own tax situation, I think you find that this course will have significant applicability to both your life and career aspirations.

You can access the course syllabus for my prior semester hybrid class at www.miracosta.edu/home/mdeschamps. Most of the info from the prior semester will be applicable for the current semester. The current semester will be posted shortly before the class actually starts. In order to be successful in this class you will need access to a computer on a regular basis and will also need to spend adequate time with the material, particularly in the beginning, to begin to understand the “flavor” of tax.

The text will be Fundamentals of Taxation 2013, Cruz et al, 6’th edition, published by McGraw-Hill, ISBN: 9781259233470. This text is available in the MiraCosta College bookstore and the bookstore will ship on a very timely basis to those who want to order on-line.

I always welcome your suggestions to help make this class more interactive and informative. I hope that with all of us working together, this class will be a rewarding and fulfilling experience for us all. 

Mike