Over the past week, 10 members from Rocky DECA went to Orlando, Florida to compete at the International Career Development Conference (ICDC).
With almost 300,000 members worldwide and over 25,000 conference attendees, this was the largest ICDC in history. The conference began on Saturday, April 26th and finished on Tuesday, April 29th. Over the period of the conference, attendees competed, networked, presented, and learned.
The members of Rocky DECA competed across six events and attended the Aspire workshop.
Nathan Woodall and Nolan Tidwell competed in the written event Independent Business Plan with their Track-A-Train project. Otis Ryan competed in the Personal Finance Series roleplay event. Amelia Milewilski and Emily Bryer competed in the Travel and Tourism Team Decision making event. Andrew Weinburger competed in the Principles of Marketing event. Edward Rinehart competed in the Entrepreneurship Series event. Charlie Wond and Jake McDill attended the Aspire workshop. Finally, Lorenzo Paustian competed in the Restaurant and Food Service Management Series event.
Emily Breyer was a top finisher in the tourism exam. Lorenzo Paustain was a top scorer in his roleplay.
Over the week, Rocky DECA tested in their events, presented their projects, visited Universal Orlando, competed in roleplay events, and networked in their workshop academy.
On day one of the conference, Rocky DECA headed to Universal Orlando theme park for DECA’s Day in the Park. This was a great way for the team to begin their week and start the conference.
The second day is when business began. Roleplay competitors had their objective tests and written competitors presented their presentation. In between competitions, the team was trading pins, collectable items from each attending state and country that represented where they were from.
On day three, roleplay competitions began. Most of the Rocky team competed on this day. While waiting in a large hall for their competition time, competitors got to meet and network with people in their events. After leaving the competition hall, there were exhibitions from colleges and employers, giving attendees more opportunities to network with those who attended.
The final day held the Achievement Award Ceremony where Lorenzo Paustain was recognized for his score in his roleplay and Emily Breyer was recognized for her top test score. Finalists were also announced for the last rounds of competition. After the ceremony, Edward Rinehart attended the Voting Delegate Session to vote on the future of the Executive leaders for the High School Division President and Vice Presidents. After, the team spent their second day at Universal.
Before departing from Orlando, the Rocky DECA team had one final day in the Universal parks, enjoying all that Orlando had to offer.
Nolan Tidwell’s favorite part of competing at ICDC was “spending quality time with my friends in Orlando and the conversations in the lazy river.”
He enjoyed getting to meet so many people from all over the world.
Otis Ryan enjoyed “spending quality time with longtime DECA friends“ during his trip to ICDC.
“I loved getting to spend a week in Orlando competing against people from all over the world.“
Next year’s International Career Development Conference takes place from April 25th to the 28th in Atlanta, Georgia. Would you like to qualify for a conference and compete with the best of the best? Leave a comment below!
