School Notes: SLHS DECA Wins Big at State Competition

South Lakes High School’s DECA marketing and management students earned two first-place titles and qualified 25 students for international competition in May at last weekend’s Virginia DECA State Leadership Conference in Virginia Beach.

The 36 SLHS students tested their skills in role-play events, rebranding plans, entrepreneurship and defended marketing research and public relations campaigns.

• Individual Role Play Events: Food Marketing Top 20 — Vikky Batra;  Restaurant & Food Service Management –- Finalist Gabe Davis;  Social Media  Top 16 — Molly Sheets.
• Team Decision Making: Travel & Tourism Marketing Team Decision — Top 20 — Cole Palley and Micky Kumbi
• Written Events: Sports & Entertainment Research Top 16 — Angela Barrale, Henning Baussus and Nik Baussus; Business Services Research Finalist — Rachel Heatherly, Paige Barlow and Ted Madden; Buying and Merchandising Research First Place Finalist — Allison LeMair, Hans Baussus and Joe Li; Entrepreneurship Written Finalist —  Mallika Suri, Chance Konnor and David Logan; Entrepreneurship Written Finalist — Jasmine Shuey, Katie Wolfe and Matthew Crump;  Entrepreneurship Innovation Plan Finalist — Shannon Meehan, Lindsey Cohen and Joshua Forrest; Entrepreneurship Innovation Finalist — Sneha Kuchipudi, Sweetlove Reyes and Brentan Walters.
• Chapter Events: Chapter competition requires group participation of DECA members. The event involves planning and execution of a public relation campaign and a creative marketing research project held in the business community.
• Public Relations Project: Capitol Hill campaign lobbying for campus fire safety, “Contain The Flame” —  State Finalist — Kelly Carney, Virginia Bulger and Gavin Brown.
• Creative Marketing Research:  Study to determine how and why residents keep their porch lights on, “Light’s ON, Crime Off”– First Place State Finalist — Tad Mich, Dania Rivas and Nicky Kandola.
• Advisor Virginia Bulger was elected to lead 14,000 Virginia DECA Members for the 2014-15 school year.

Herndon’s Mainor a future medical leader — Seara Minor, a sophomore at Herndon High, recently attended the Congress of Future Medical Leaders in Washington, D.C.  This honors-only program is designed for exceptional high school students who want to become physicians or go into medical research, and is sponsored by the National Academy of Future Physicians and Medical Scientists.  Mainor represented Virginia at the conference, and was nominated based on her academic achievement, leadership potential, and determination to serve humanity in the field of medicine.   

Hughes Student Wins NOAA Art Contest — Elizabeth Shaw, a student at Langston Hughes Middle, has been named winner of the 2014 Marine Debris Art Contest, sponsored by NOAA.  Shaw’s drawing of marine debris was selected from over 400 entries across the U.S. and will appear on NOAA’s 2015 Marine Debris Planner, an annual planner used for marine debris education and outreach.   

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