Stoneman Douglas DECA Students Take Home Top Awards at International Conference

May 9, 2015 • By Sharon Aron Baron

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[caption id="attachment_11536" align="aligncenter" width="720"] Robert Tromberg, Michael Weissman and Harrison Cohn[/caption]

By: Moises Lobaton

[caption id="attachment_11537" align="alignright" width="187"] Jason Waldinger[/caption]

Marjory Stoneman Douglas DECA which is the eight largest chapter in the world, had 39 members attend the International Career Development Conference in Orlando this year. A record thirteen of those students went on to become finalists and they competed once more to determine the top-ten winners in each competition category. Nine of these competitors became top-ten winners in their categories. This includes a 1st place winner in the Stock Market Game category as well as two 3rd place winners who competed in the Stock Market Game and Restaurant and Food Service Management. The awards and recognition well surpassed that of previous years.

The most remarkable success that the chapter had at this conference was with the Stock Market Game. In this category, teams of students first created virtual investment portfolios and they were given three months to gain as much as possible with the original amount provided of $100,000. The chapter’s teams were able to perform well with the leading team generating a return of over 31 percent. Cyril Yared, one of the members on this team, describes the Stock Market Game as being “a profound experience which gave [him] the skills necessary to be able to participate and profit from the real Stock Market.” At the conference, the teams presented their investment portfolios and the strategies that they used to win. All four teams who competed became finalists.

[caption id="attachment_11539" align="alignleft" width="333"] Jeremy Tromer, Karen Garza and Nicole Donato[/caption]

All students who attended the conference were able to greatly develop their presentation and leadership skills. They also networked with other chapters from around the countries to be able to bring ideas back that the chapter could implement.

The chapter dedicated their success to Mitchell Albert, Sharon Cutler, and Lisa Webster who are the chapter’s advisors. They are extremely proud with the hard work of the DECA members and the success generated as a result.

Marjory Stoneman Douglas DECA is one of the largest clubs at the school with over 460 members. All students in Marketing and Academy of Finance classes have the opportunity to become members of DECA, a worldwide student organization.

[caption id="attachment_11538" align="alignright" width="333"] Mitchell Albert, Lisa Webster, Cyril Yared, Brandon Chou and Sharon Cutler[/caption]

DECA is a career and technical student organization composed of more than 200,000 students who are interested in careers in marketing, entrepreneurship, finance, hospitality or management. DECA enhances the preparation for college and careers by providing co-curricular programs that integrate into classroom instruction, apply learning, connect to business and promote competition. DECA student members leverage their DECA experience to become academically prepared, community oriented, professionally responsible, experienced leaders.

Moises Lobaton is a student at Marjory Stoneman Douglas and a member of DECA.

Author Profile

Sharon Aron Baron

Editor of Talk Media and writer for Coral Springs Talk. CST was created in 2012 to provide News, Views, and Entertainment for the residents of Coral Springs and the rest of South Florida.