From January 12 to January 14, Irvington DECA competed at the Northern California DECA Career Development Conference (NorCal CDC) in San Ramon. As a team, Irvington should be proud: they championed the Norcal tournament as the number one chapter in the conference. With fourteen first place awards and a hundred competitors in the top ten, Irvington continued their trend of performing well at the annual competition. Irvington did especially well in the Integrated Marketing Campaign Service, sweeping the top five awards in the event. 

DECA has three different levels of competition: district, state, and international. NorCal, a district level conference, consists of all the DECA chapters in Northern California, and is one of the first stepping stones to state conferences. NorCal is one of the first major conferences of the year, and it helps new members to get used to competing. For returning members, it’s good practice as they prepare to compete at states and then eventually qualify for ICDC. 

Events typically consist of a role-playing section and also a presentation section, and participants compete in one of each. Roleplays are impromptu events, where you get ten minutes (or thirty minutes as a team) to prepare a topic and then present it to a panel of judges, which might be parents or business professionals, depending on the type of competition. The presentation events are more prepared, where members might have to create an online report on the topic beforehand, and then present it. 

Events are judged through Performance Indicators (PIs) which judge contestants on how well they explain certain vocabulary or concepts, for example, a participant might be asked to explain promotion. PIs and other parts of the presentation rubric, such as visuality, are judged on varying metrics. For example, a PI might be judged on a scale from 0-14. 

Additionally, competitors are tested on topics such as marketing, business administration, entrepreneurship, hospitality and tourism, and finance. 

“We’ve seen a lot of new members do well,” said Shreya Prashantha, Director of Varsity, (11), “That’s encouraging to see, and a sign that our Wednesday Workshops are working out well.” 

Wednesday Workshops were an important part of preparing the competitors for NorCal, giving them a chance to work with mentorship groups. They are usually split into two groups, new and experienced, and varsity will sometimes have their own session and sometimes help out the others. Sessions can include practice for testing, presentations, and worktime—anything that members need help with. 

Additionally, Irvington DECA also collaborated with Washington High School in December to host a student-run Miniconference known as Minicon. This served as practice for new members, and gave them a chance to gain experience in a simulated conference. 

Still, managing the logistics of such an important trip didn’t come without its challenges. Irvington used to offer a zero period, allowing freshmen and sophomores to take on additional courses. Without a zero period, it is difficult for underclassmen to fit in a CTE course within their schedules, making it hard to take part in conferences. Now that they had fulfilled their P.E course credits, there were more juniors able to take the course and join DECA to participate competitively. There were also a lot more people at NorCal this year (around 1500), and that made events a little more competitive. The opening and award ceremonies were a little crowded, and not everyone could fit into a hall together. 

 “All our chaperones were super helpful,” said Shubha Vajragiri, DECA Co-President (12)

 “Ms. Summer is our new advisor this year, and she’s doing a phenomenal job, but because she was new there was just a lot more communication that had to be done. We’re all thankful for all the work she’s put in.” Even with all the logistical challenges, NorCal went smoothly without a hitch. 

“Our officer team has improved a lot and was very prepared for NorCal this year. Everything was a lot easier to manage despite having a new advisor,” Vajragiri added. 

In all, Irvington DECA will be pleased by their performance at NorCal, and will look to prepare for new competitions for the future. As they move to compete at states in March, they will take what they learned from Northern California DECA Career Development Conference and apply it at DECA’s ICDC, (International Career Development Conference).