DECA (Distributive Education Clubs of America) is a student organization that helps students develop skills for marketing and business careers.
“DECA as a whole is basically a business-oriented program that teaches you a lot of business skills and talking and speaking and working with different businesses,” senior Kennedy York said.
Within DECA, the leadership group is called Cadre. Cadre is for the senior class, and it takes place during fourth and fifth period. To get in, students must go through an application process. Cadre bakes cookies to sell every Thursday at the middle schools and Friday at BHS. They also work on projects throughout the year to use at competitions.
For these projects, students can either compete in a role-play-style project where they get a question and must answer it on the spot. The second option is where they work on a paper all year and present it to the judges at the competition.
“We definitely do have a lot of stuff that we have to do with our projects and with making cookies and selling clothes,” senior Rachel Hylton said.
Every day, they work on these projects that can involve volunteering and community work, such as foodbank donations, homeless shelter donations and holiday drives. They work on this project all year and then present it to the judges at state.
“And then if you place in the top three at state, there’s internationals in April, which this year is in Atlanta,” Hylton said.
These competitions can make public speaking and coming up with solutions on the spot easier. This can help with real life situations in jobs that involve business and marketing.
“Presenting a project that you’ve created is also something that is really applicable in the real business world,” Hylton said.
