Wenatchee High School’s DECA team traveled to the Washington State DECA Career Development Conference on February 26th in Bellevue, WA after qualifying at their regional competition earlier this year. The students that earned a spot at the state competition has already proven themselves with placing with team and individual events, allowing them to represent the Wenatchee Panthers at the state level.
The trip lasted three days and it included competitions, workshops and time spent with other DECA teams and members from across Washington State. WHS DECA team has spent time preparing together throughout the school year for this state competition. The advisor, Ms. Larkin, talked about how the team prepared for the big event.
“Student members practiced role play scenarios, studied, and spent a lot of time with each other,” Larkin said.
Leading up to this, team members focused on improving their presentations, and becoming more confident and sure when they speak in front of the judges. Advisors helped organize practice sessions at lunch and gave feed back to to help the students feel prepared before leaving on the Thursday of February 26th.
DECA Inc. is a program that focuses on business, marketing, finance, hospitality and management. At the Washington state conference, Wenatchee students competed in events such as marketing role plays, team decision making events and prepared written projects. In the role play events, the students were given a business situation and had a limited amount of time to brainstorm and write down ideas before they would present it to a judge. Written events required students to create business plans or research projects ahead of time and then present them to the judges at the conference.
While in Belleuve, Wenatchee students also attended workshops and leadership sessions. These sessions covered topics related to business skills, communication, and future career opportunities. In addition to competing, students had the chance to meet other DECA members from different schools around the state. The experience allowed them to see how other teams prepare and their techniques. The team returned home on February 28th, as Cici Tang placed top 15 and Hannah Beckstead and Jaxen Gonzalez are going to nationals for SBE (School based enterprise).
