Four UCS High Schools earn national recognition for business education

All four Utica Community Schools high school stores have earned national recognition for promoting entrepreneurship and excellence in business education.

The school stores received national certification for outstanding achievement for their school-based enterprises (SBE) through DECA.

DECA, an organization that prepares emerging leaders and entrepreneurs for careers and education in marketing, finance, hospitality and management in high schools and colleges around the globe, selected just over 300 school stores for Gold-level Certification, or Gold Re-certification, from a nationwide competing field of hundreds of schools.

Henry Ford II, Stevenson and Utica high schools all received Gold Re-certification. Eisenhower High School participated for the first time and received Gold Certification for their entry.

To become DECA-Certified, SBEs complete a written project detailing how their business adheres to select model business standards. After the documentation is submitted, a review committee evaluates the documentation to determine which level of certification has been achieved. Recognition is provided for outstanding achievement at three levels: bronze, silver and gold.

For the fifth year in a row, the Chief Connection store earned National Re-certification status based on a 25-page project written by Utica High School students Olivia Windorf, Tyler Newton, and Bridget Foehl. This year DECA project deadlines were a month earlier and Marketing Teacher Dana Boice, chief connection director and DECA advisor at Utica High School, proudly announced that the Utica High students were among the first 200 schools nationwide to receive Gold Re-certification and secure an invitation to the National competition.

Boice says her students are very excited to compete nationally and maintain Utica’s top ten standing. “I feel very confident,” said Tyler Newton, a 17 year old junior at Utica High and first year DECA team member. “We’ve put a lot of hard work into this project and hopefully it’ll pay off at nationals.”

This is the third straight year for the Henry Ford II store, the Ford Dealers, to receive Gold-recertification. Student DECA Members, Jarrett Ciesluk, Andrew Palomba, and Sean Russell wrote Henry Ford II’s winning project submission. “We are very proud of these students, as well as the entire school store staff, on operating a successful school store,” noted Jennifer DeClerck, Marketing Teacher and DECA Advisor at Henry Ford II. “They exceeded all expectations on each of the areas: Market Planning, Product/Service Management, and Selling.”

Stevenson High School students, Kyle Cook, Brandon Salha and Zharia Woodards, secured a Gold Re-certification for the second year for the Mount Olympus Titan Shoppe, also making them eligible to compete at the national conference.

Senior and 17 year old DECA member Kyle Cook prepares the store to open each morning and helps to manage it commented, “It was pretty cool that we received Gold Re-certification again. I had fun working on the project.” Kyle is looking forward to competing in Nashville.

Senior Eisenhower High School students, Allison Chriss, Jacob Oyster and Anthony (AJ) Warner with the assistance of their Marketing Teacher and DECA advisor Louise LaFaive, submitted their school’s first DECA project and earned a Gold Certification for their school store the Eagles Nest. “We are all very excited to be given this award,” LaFaive said of her DECA team. “We worked very hard to make sure it was our best work.”

Eisenhower, Henry Ford II, Stevenson, and Utica high schools will all send student representatives to participate in the exclusive School-based Enterprise Academy, only open to invited Gold Certified and Gold Re-certified school stores. The Academy is held annually during DECA’s International Career Development Conference (ICDC). The ICDC will be April 23-26, 2016 at Music City Center in Nashville, TN.

School-based Enterprises are effective educational tools in helping to prepare students for the transition from school to work or college. For many students, they provide the first work experience; for others, they provide an opportunity to build management, supervision and leadership skills.

DECA’s School-based Enterprise Certification Program was developed to provide recognition for outstanding achievement to grow and strive SBEs to strive for excellence . DECA currently has over 215,000 members with 3,500 high school chapters.

Complete information about DECA’s School-based Enterprise Certification Program can be found at www.deca.org/sbe.