First Place winners from Coral Glades High School in Coral Springs: Jillian Edrich, Murtaza Hussain, Joseph Robinson with their DECA Advisor Drew Goldfinger.

By: Sharon Aron Baron

The Coral Glades High School DECA Club brought their best to the International Career Development Conference in Orlando and brought back some big awards including First Place for a financial literacy program.

DECA which stands for Distributive Education Clubs of America can be found in over 3,500 high schools across the globe. Coral Glades sent 17 students, or eight groups, to compete against the world’s best at the ICDC conference in April –  part of 20,000 DECA members competing in a range of marketing, finance, hospitality, and entrepreneurship-based competitive events over a two-day day period.

The competitions range from participating in a role-play, in which the student acts out a real-life business scenario in front of a judge, to writing and presenting business plans on fictitious business ideas, to presenting projects individual chapters complete to better their local community.

Four of the groups from Coral Glades, or seven students, were recognized as Top 20 International Finalists, which is one of the highest in the school’s history: Rebekah Brodsky, Jillian Edrich, Addi Harrison, Kayla Haweny, Murtaza Hussain, Devin Katz and Joseph Robinson.

Top award went to Edrich, Hussain and Robinson who placed First in the World for their Financial Literacy Promotion Project “Fostering the Future of Finance” which worked with Junior Achievement, the FLITE Center of Fort Lauderdale, Coral Glades High Seniors, and second graders at Westchester Elementary School, instructing them on the importance of becoming fiscally responsible in the future.

DECA Advisor Drew Goldfinger dedicates countless hours towards helping their students succeed. Reaching this level of achievement just always seemed like a dream he said.

“I can’t accurately put into words how it feels to be the advisor of these amazing students –  a record four groups of International Finalists, as well as a First Place International Winner.” 

In addition to those groups recognized as Top 20 International Finalists, students, Darin Burgos, Ethan Daruwalla, Jacob Evans, Daniel Fernandez, Mckenzie Joy, Madison Propper, Bryce Rader, Audrey Ramos, Sean Tzoucalis and Valeria Vasquez-Barros also dedicated countless hours towards competing at ICDC.

Goldfinger said, “I am so proud of all Coral Glades DECA has accomplished this year, and it is a true honor to be able to share that with the city of Coral Springs. This is a year I will remember forever.”