North Allegheny students qualify for International Career Development Conference

Sixty-one North Allegheny DECA members competed at the 68^th DECA State Career Development Conference held in Hershey in February. Twelve of these students qualified to compete at the DECA International Career Development Conference (ICDC), which will be held April 26 through May 1 in Orlando, Fla. These students include:

• · Saif Ali and Akshana Dassanaike - third Place, Community Service Project
• · Jerry Huang, Anchey Peng, and Josh Zhou - third Place, Entrepreneurship Promotion
• · Michelle Hwang and Sreeja Yellapragada - second Place, Entrepreneurship Team Decision Making
• · Shreya Boppudi and Divya Ramkumar - second Place, Marketing Management Team Decision Making
• · Jacob Pan - second Place, Business Growth Plan
• · Evan Kitterly - second Place, Sports & Entertainment Marketing
• · Rosy Chen - fourth Place, Principles of Hospitality & Tourism

An additional five students were finalists, and seven students received medallions for top scores on their test and/or role plays.

Finalists include:

• · Spencer Kohlmann, Aaron Miller, and Abi Sekhar - Finance Operations Research
• · Ellen Poplavska - Marketing Communications
• · Sanae Heist - Quick Serve Restaurant Management

Medallion recipients include:

• · Lucy Eppich
• · Grant Baierl
• · Kira Klein (2)
• · Shreya Boppudi
• · Divya Ramkumar
• · Kelso Fielder
• · Rosy Chen

As members of the PA DECA State Officer Team, students Ellen Poplavska and Kira Klein were instrumental in planning and executing the state conference. Student Peter Van Osdol was also inducted into his position as the District 2 Representative on the PA DECA State Officer Team for the 2019-20 school year.

The North Allegheny chapter of DECA was also recognized for increasing its membership, and received the Green Level Award for completing all of the required activities and community service for the Plan of Action.

DECA is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit global student organization that “prepares emerging leaders and entrepreneurs for careers in marketing, finance, hospitality, and management in high schools and colleges.”