Madie Blais
Staff Writer
On March 12th DECA, WA’s business club, headed to Boston to compete at states. The three day competition produced the best results Westford Academy has ever seen.
Thursday and Friday over 170 WA DECA students competed in role plays, presentations, and tests against all other Massachusetts DECA students who qualified for states. This year the club has beat every record that it had, winning a record amount of trophies, scholarship money, and places at nationals.
“Last year Mr. Gagne and I talked and we had our best, most successful year ever, and looking at our roster and all the upperclassman from last year that were graduating we figured we’d never be able to duplicate it again. And then we had a lot of underclassman this year, we had no expectations, and the kids ended up beating last years numbers; it was kind of outrageous.” said advisor to the DECA club, John Rogers.
Westford Academy brought 177 students to states to compete, the biggest group that WA has ever brought. Students competed with about 2,500 others for a spot at Nationals in Orlando. 34 students, the most ever, have made it to compete at ICDC, International Career Development Conference, in Orlando, Florida where over 17,000 students from all over the world are expected to attend.
WA DECA students took home 30% of all the awards in events that were competed in. Eight of those students made a combined 5,100$ in scholarship money.
Another big accomplishment was two state officers voted into office this year, junior Kyle Pilachowski, who ran for his second year, and sophomore Ankeeta Patil. Only once before has a school had two students as state officer at once.
Students going to Nationals
Last Name
First Name
Partner Name
Grade
Individual and Team (2) Role Play Events
Agrawal
Anant
11
Human Resources Mgmt Series—HRM
Agrawal
Aishwarya
10
Marketing Management Series—MMS
Blais
Madison
11
Leadership Academy
Burke
Caileigh
Leah Calitri
11
(2)Mktg Communications Team—MTDM
Calitri
Leah
Caileigh Burke
11
(2)Mktg Communications Team—MTDM
Chaloori
Pranav
10
Food Marketing Series—FMS
Ding
Jerry
9
Principles of Business Mgmt—PBM
Donescu
Victoria
9
Principles of Business Mgmt—PBM
Eddy
Colin
11
Retail Merchandising Series—RMS
Ellis
David
11
Accounting Applications Series—ACT
Fleischer
Zachary
11
Quick Serve Rest Mgmt Series— QSRM
Gillett
David
11
Leadership Academy
Harkness
Joe
11
Business Services Marketing Series—BSM
Hu
Gary
11
Business Services Marketing Series—BSM
Jani
Eashan
Kyle Ryan
12
(2)Sports & Enter. Marketing Team—STDM
Jung
Hannah
12
Professional Selling Event – PSE
Kagalavadi
Trisha
10
Business Finance Series—BFS
Makhija
Prateek
Iman Zarrinkoub
11
(2)Travel & Tourism Team—TTDM
Patil
Ankeeta
10
Apparel & Accessories Mktg Series— AAM
Pilachowski
Kyle
11
Hotel & Lodging Management Series—HLM
Porter
Andrew
11
Financial Consulting Event — FCE
Prasath
Sneha
9
Principles of Hospitality & Tourism—PHT
Rastogi
Chinar
11
Business Finance Series—BFS
Ryan
Kyle
Eashan Jani
12
(2)Sports & Enter. Marketing Team—STDM
Shao
Andy
11
Principles of Finance—PFN
Sheth
Nihar
10
Business Finance Series—BFS
Srivastava
Varun
10
Principles of Marketing—PMK
Vellal
Adithya
9
Principles of Finance—PFN
Wang
Edward
12
Accounting Applications Series—ACT
Wu
Emily
11
Rest and Food Service Mgmt Series—RFSM
Zarrinkoub
Iman
Prateek Makhija
11
(2)Travel & Tourism Team—TTDM