DECA students competed at their State Conference competition in Hershey from Wednesday, Feb. 26- Friday, Feb. 28. Students competed to participate at the DECA International Career Development Conference which is held in Atlanta, Georgia in May.
1,900 students competed at the State Conference from around 83 schools. Students who won Fourth Place or higher will have the choice to compete at the ICDC. There were 74 Bethel students who competed and 10 finalists who qualified for the National competition.
At the State Conference, students had to take a test and perform a “role play” in front of their judges for the same marketing event they had chosen for their District Competition in December. Individual events had two separate role plays, and team events had only one. Students also had the choice to present a presentation in front of judges to qualify for the National Conference.
Tara Nath, a junior at Bethel Park, ran a campaign to be elected as the new DECA Pennsylvania State President. She was very successful with her campaign and was elected to be the 2014-2015 DECA PA president.
President Tara Nath said, “I really wanted the opportunity to make a difference and give back to an organization that means too much to me. As president, I want to help make the state more connected and have more schools give back to their communities.”
Amanda Stofesky, a senior at BPHS who was elected last year to be a part of the PA DECA Executive Council for the 2014 State Conference, received the PA DECA Scholarship for $1,000 this year.
Congratulations to the following students who qualified for the National Conference:
Tara Nath and Amanda Stofesky- First Place in the Sports and Entertainment Promotion Plan event
Erik Stack- Second Place in the Buying and Merchandising Operations Research event
Tasha George and Carolyn Vona- Second Place in the Hospitality Services Team event
Emma Bruno and Justin Nath- Third Place in the Marketing Communications Team event
Sean McClaine- Fourth Place in the Marketing Management event
Natalie Lalama- Fifth Place in the Restaurant and Food Service Management event
Abby Hartzell- Fifth Place in the Job Interview event
Nine students won Medallion Awards for the top three test scores or best role play scores for Role Play A and Role Play B. Congratulations to:
Jake Bartolomucci- Sports and Entertainment Promotion Plan test
Natalie Lalama- Restaurant and Food Service Management test
Sean McClaine- Marketing Management test
Tara Nath and Amanda Stofesky- Sports and Entertainment Promotion Plan test
Emma Bruno and Justin Nath- Marketing Communications Team test
Tasha George and Carolyn Vona- Hospitality Services Team Role Play A