On March 4, seven North students competed at the DECA state competition. They competed in six different categories and had two state medalists. Paden Thompson, senior, was a state medalist in Financial Consulting and Alyssa Joseph, junior, was a state medalist in Principles of Business Management and Administration.

This year, DECA state qualifiers were chosen by the club advisers, Mike Horn and Steve Haftl.

“We were scheduled to have our regional but because of the lockdowns and the mask thing, they had to postpone it and suspend it. So then students were going to state based off of adviser’s recommendations and how they were doing in their clubs,” said Horn. “So we brought the students to state that wanted to go and felt that they were able to compete at that level.”

DECA competitors pick one area of interest and specialize in that field to prepare for competitions. They can compete in six different categories: business management and administration, entrepreneurship, finance, hospitality and tourism, marketing and personal finance literacy. Competitions can consist of two different parts.

“There’s a multiple choice part and then there’s role plays,” said Thompson.

Other competitors who competed at state are Justin Hughes, who competed in Virtual Business; Madison Zabolotzky and Connor Glanzman, who competed in Travel and Tourism as a team; Carley Abi-Rached, who won a bronze medal in the iConnect competition and Amena Hussain, who competed in Restaurant and Food Service Management.

Due to the pandemic, this school year has been the first semi-normal competition season in almost two years for DECA. However, DECA is still looking to expand their numbers and have more students competing next year.

“We definitely want to continue to grow a little bit and recruit more students, because with the pandemic some students dropped out or lost interest because the competitions weren’t really there. So we definitely want to bring that back,” said Horn.

DECA is open to all students, not just those taking business classes, and no experience is necessary. The club will work with you to help maximize your talents.

“People should join DECA because it’s a cool club to experience going to competitions, and you get to learn about business,” said Joseph. 

DECA meets every Monday in room 114.