FanTAXtic Four: Accounting Students to Compete Nationally at Deloitte Finals

“Fan” and “tax” in the same utterance? It can only mean one thing: the subject-savvy students of Isenberg have done it again.

For the fourth year running, Isenberg will advance to nationals in the Deloitte FanTAXtic Case Competition, a prestigious invitational that helps students gain real-world business experience. Isenberg’s 2023 team—including senior Ronny Chan, junior Robert Arrellano, and sophomores Jacob Chiapponi and Ahnaf Shahriar Hogue—will head to Westlake, Texas, this month, ready to match corporate-tax wits with other top students from across the country.

“There are more than 200 students and faculty from approximately 40 colleges and universities that compete regionally, and ours will be one of only 16 teams advancing to the national finals,” said Isenberg Lecturer Jennifer Roy, who, along with Senior Lecturer II Cathy Lowry, serves as a faculty advisor for the team. “This is Isenberg’s fourth consecutive year having at least one team advance, which is a testament to the caliber of highly motivated students that Isenberg attracts.”

Commitment Pays Off

For the regional competition, global professional services network Deloitte selected teams through an application process in September and assigned them a hypothetical real-world scenario. Each team then researched ways to address the case’s potential business and tax implications, delivering their comprehensive solution to judges in a virtual presentation on October 28. Just hours later, Deloitte announced the few finalists—eliciting familiar congrats around Isenberg.

“I believe our team’s commitment to researching the tax issues, as well as the poise and professionalism they displayed during their presentation and question-and-answer sessions, made them stand out as winners of this year’s competition,” Roy said.   

She added that while she and Lowry were there to assist with general strategies and provide suggestions, Isenberg’s latest FanTAXtic victory belongs to the four accounting students who earned it.

“They worked very hard,” Roy said of Chan, Arrellano, Chiapponi, and Hogue. “Together, they were able to formulate a plan to analyze the data and prepare a professional presentation, even in light of the tight timeline. We are very proud of our student team.” 

The national competition takes place on Friday, January 20th, and Saturday, January 21st.