DECA Down In Detroit

The weekend of November 16-18, 19 members of the Hastings Senior High School DECA chapter traveled to Detroit, Michigan to take part in the Central Region Leadership Conference.  At this event, the participants, as well as the teacher sponsors that traveled along with them, had the opportunity to listen and engage with many different speakers consisting of various leadership curriculum as well as take part in the city life of Detroit.

This trip was one that every DECA member was allowed to go to.  This DECA chapter’s sponsor, Gwen Davidson was pleased with the large numbers signed up to go this year.  

“This particular trip was a go and learn trip and so as long as you were a DECA member you were welcomed to go and I was very pleased and surprised that we had 19 kids sign up to go,” Davidson said.

The members that decided to take this long 15-hour bus drive to Detroit were presented with various leadership curriculum upon entering the conference.  

“The members were able to choose their sessions they wanted to attend. They had sessions about entrepreneurship, business and marketing as well as competitions and how to be more competitive and how to prepare for competitions,” Davidson said.

Junior Grant Beard was one of the 19 members that attended. He found interest in going to this conference to learn from others on how to better himself as a businessman.  Of the many workshops presented he chose to attend a counterfeit goods and muscular dystrophy association meeting.

“I went to these because I thought they would be interesting and engaging,” Beard said.

Every member that attended, went for a reason.  Senior Grace Dinnell found an interest in the business portion of this conference. She hoped to gain knowledge and perspective to help her in her future pathway.

“I planned to learn a new perspective on the business world, and learn skills I can use in my career pathway,” Dinnell said.

However, it wasn’t all strictly business for this DECA chapter.  The chapter was presented with many opportunities to get out and explore the wonderful city of Detroit.  They had the chance to visit the Henry Ford Museum, tour the Ford F-150 factory, take a ride on the Detroit Princess (a massive riverboat), go to many different restaurants, stay in a very large hotel which housed things such as a 7/11 and CVS Pharmacy as well as a large number of different restaurants, and go to the Canadian border.  

“My favorite thing we did was ride the Detroit Princess and enjoy the many activities available while onboard,” junior Thomas Harling said.

If this trip wasn’t enough already, in January the Hastings High DECA chapter will attend a one-day competition at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, and have state screenings in which officers are elected. Then you can expect to see the members compete at state DECA in Lincoln for three days.  Those that qualify will then attend Nationals in Orlando, Florida this summer.

Photo courtesy of Gwen Davidson