UTAH TECH UNIVERSITY'S STUDENT NEWS SOURCE | March 28, 2024

The Adrian Project comes to DSU

DSU will host the IRS Adrian Project to give students a glimpse into the work of an IRS Criminal Investigation special agent. Elissa Aguayo | Sun News Daily

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It may not be as glamorous as Tom Cruise in “Mission Impossible” or any other spy movie out there, but it’s definitely not just another average desk job.

If you think every accountant sits at a desk all day, then wait until you hear about the Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation Unit.

For years the IRS Criminal Investigation Unit has presented its Adrian Project to college campuses nationwide in an effort to recruit their newest batches of agents. The project’s goal is to have students conduct an investigation tracing illegitimate money from the scene of the crime back to the criminal.

According to the IRS: “Students are ‘sworn in’ as special agents in the morning and will wear IRS-CI protective vests, use handcuffs, toy guns and radios to communicate with their counterpart agents on the case. The students will sharpen their forensic accounting skills through document analysis, interview suspects, and conduct surveillance. The day ends when the students have obtained sufficient evidence of the crime which results in the arrest of the mock offender.”

Rochelle Blatter, senior career counselor, credited Cindy Greenman, associate professor of accounting, for helping bring the event to Dixie State University. Blatter said Greenman has hosted the project at a previous school.

Blatter said: “She wanted to bring the opportunity to DSU and so we requested that they consider DSU to the hold the event. They selected our school and we are excited to participate.”

Cindy Greenman said, “The IRS Adrian Project is part of the Dixie Student Chapter of the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners. The student chapter meets monthly and this particular event is our semester event.”

The opportunity will give students a unique insight that can also serve as a reward for how they will be able to use their accounting skills without having to worry about sitting at a desk job all day.

Greenman said in order to register, you must register with her in person. She said registration for the event is almost full and expects it to fill up completely by the time we head for spring break.

Special agents from the IRS Criminal Investigation Phoenix Field Office will host the project at DSU March 31 from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. with dinner provided for participants from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.