Blake’s DECA chapter, a group under the larger national body Distributive Education Clubs of America, saw many of its members make a statement at the Districts Competition on Sunday, Jan. 12. It’s mission  is to encourage the development of business and leadership skills through academic conferences and competitions.

     Blake’s director of finance Raj Mallawaaratchy leads the group, and DECA offers a rigorous business education sparsely located in the Blake course choices. Alice Jin ’20 says, “to come up with a theoretical business/company and explore concepts in business, which is not taught in regular Blake classes.”

     Student competitors qualified across all four grades at the competition ñ among them Jin and Timo Hemphill ’20. The class of 2021 led the way with Bella Orht ’21, Amanda Ward ë21, and Samrat Pradhan ’21.

               Tanush Dhingra ’23 was only one of two freshmen to qualify. Most events consist of either a business plan or a role play. Business plans are usually around ten pages long, and presented in front of a judge. More impressively, podium placements in the qualifying round were taken in four different business sectors: Business Growth (Elle McCarty ’21, third place), Human Resources Management (Morgan Swigert ’20, third), Independent Business Plan (Hemphill, Swigert, and Vorbrich, second), lastly Hemphill took first in the Marketing Communication Series. Additionally, Mabel Chovan-Aziz ’21 and Ford Ashmun ’20 won second place in Market Decision Making.   

     Members of DECA continue to work hard, seeking success in the approaching State Career Development Conference, taking place on March 1 through 3.