Troy High DECA Students Shine in District Competition

Troy High DECA competed this past Saturday at Lake Orion High School for DECA District Competition. (DECA stands for Distributive Education Clubs of America).

Out of the 89 students competing from Troy High, 74 students qualifying for state competition, which will be held in March in Detroit. Of these students, 44 received test medals, and 53 students who received role play medals. In total, Troy High received 171 medals on Saturday.

During DECA competitions, members are focused on improving their leadership and professional skills, in hopes of making their way to the finalist stage. It is a time and effort commitment, according to Elena Wollborg Marketing Teacher & DECA Advisor “We start the second week of school and meet every single week for about an hour to prep together for competition.” Students work alongside their peers, studying for their DECA test and listening to other presentations and sharing constructive feedback to other members.

At the upcoming State competition, Troy High students will have an opportunity to meet DECA members from around the state, interact with important business representatives, and last but not least, compete for a chance to represent Michigan DECA at the International Career Development Conference in April.

The DECA members listed below are advancing to states; students with an * beside their name also "swept" their category, which means that they placed first in every event possible for district competition.

Troy High State Qualifying Students: (* = swept category)

Meera Manek*

Ananya Ramanan

Elaina Rondeau

Amay Baweja

Ellen Latysh*

Bessiana Shaska

Erin Jeong*

Vienna Thieu*

Sravya Kankatala

Sriyan Madagula*

Varun Sukhavasi

Neha Sil*

Mlahat Mahmood

Siddarth Akalankam

Raghav Sivakumar

Michael Hsiao

Fida Rahman

Sharanya Swaminathan*

Angela Xu*

Jungmin Ahn

Dean Vichitpap

Nishit Palepu*

Athrv Siriki

Mark Haerens

Linsey Chen

Anshul Singh

Riley Lennon

Caitlin Dawson

Ingrid Huang*

Charlotte Worrel*

Divya Prassana

Jennifer Bricker*

Sameer Khed*

Aditya Shankar

Arush Alapati

Sarah Harrison

Dina Ni*

Ayushi Gupta*

Jayanth Batti

Ajitesh Venkatesh*

Pranav Bellad*

Dilan Swami*

Noelle Kwok

Amy Tian

Abby Cremers*

Vandhana Purushathaman*

Bethanie Joy

Muhammad Qureshi

Harry Wang*

George Perakis*

Matthew Zhao*

Shreyanna Keeta

Vinati Donthireddy

Yuktha Puluvarthi*

Jesse Chang*

Joe Kleimann

Sparsh Shrivastava*

Katie Morris

Kaustubh Siriki

Julia Mowrey*

Aleena Malik

Sarayu Bethamcherla*

Alexa Michalec*

Cynthia Wang*

Elise Hsiao*

Pranav Atyam

Aryan Gupta*

Miranda Siegan*

Max Falk

Krish Gupta*

John Palomino*

Olivia Xu*

Charitha Meda

Simrun Sharma

For many returning students involved this year, it was their first in-person competition, since everything was in a virtual format last year. Concluded Wollborg: “It was great to be back in person and feel that energy at awards when their name is called and they rush up to the stage to receive their medallion, sometimes plural.”

Photo courtesy of the Troy School District