Dozens of LWSD students earned their way to the 2021 International Career Development Conference (ICDC), which was held virtually in late April and early May. Of that group, about 30 students competed as finalists and two students placed as high as third. ICDC took place between April 19 - April 30, and the Grand Awards Session finalized the conference on May 6. Nearly 13,000 DECA members competed during the virtual conference, representing the best-of-the-best from association conferences that qualified them to attend this elite group of competitors. Most of DECA’s 59 competitive events each fielded approximately 175 competition entries, representing thousands of competitors at the local, regional and state/provincial levels. ICDC Competitors qualified past the regional and state conferences for the opportunity to compete internationally.

“These DECA members should be commended for earning the remarkable recognition as an international honoree,” said Frank Peterson, executive director of DECA Inc. “Their success in our competitive events program — especially in a virtual format — is just one indicator that they are striving to be college and career ready through their classroom learning.”

DECA members presented case study solutions and presentations through recorded videos, with approximately the top 20 competitors in each competitive event earning the opportunity to deliver a final presentation in a virtual meeting with a business professional live over Zoom®. 

This year’s #DECAICDC featured 17,000 members and advisors in attendance. In addition to career-based competition, DECA members engaged in a series of leadership sessions, watched an interview with keynote Marcus Lemonis from CNBC’s The Profit, and streamed video presentations provided by more than 50 internationally recognized businesses.

Students from all four of Lake Washington School District’s comprehensive high schools participated in the competition. Here is a list of the LWSD students who competed as finalists at the competition (DNP=did not place):

Business Growth Plan

• 4th place – Austin Picinich, Juanita High School 

Finance Operations Research

• Finalist/DNP – Aarya Kalki and Sophia Masterson, Eastlake High School 

Apparel and Accessories Marketing Series

• Finalist/DNP - Dominic Newman, Lake Washington High School 

Accounting Applications Series

• DNP - Vaishnavi Vidyasagar, Eastlake High School 
• Finalist/DNP - Victoria Humann, Eastlake High School 

Business Finance Services

• DNP - Sameeksha Sharma, Redmond High School 
• 3rd place - Dhruv Srinivasan, Redmond High School 
• 9th place - Arjun Menon, Eastlake High School 

Entrepreneurship Series

• Finalist/DNP - Sayan Bhatia, Redmond High School 

Food Marketing Series

• DNP - Rohinee Mattikalli, Eastlake High School 

Human Resources Management

• DNP - Ailee Yoshida, Redmond High School 
• DNP - Liam Green, Lake Washington High School 

Restaurant and Food Service Management Series

• 5th place - Raia Gulam, Lake Washington High School 

Integrated Marketing Campaign – Service

• 4th place – Aaagney Iyer/Esther Liu, Juanita High School 

Personal Financial Literacy

• 3rd place - Jasmine Yang, Juanita High School 
• Finalist/DNP - Kate Dykhnova, Redmond High School 

Business Solutions Project

• Finalist/DNP – Eric Zhou, Redmond High School 

Career Development Project

• DNP/Finalist - Mili Joshi and Sanjana Reddy, Lake Washington High School 

School Based Enterprise - Retail Operations

• 8th place – Ranen Biswas, Ameya Deo, Amay Bansal, Eastlake High School 

Entrepreneurship Team Decision Making

• 9th place - Suhani Nog and Arjun Mahesh, Eastlake High School 

Hospitality Services Team Decision Making

• 10th place - Kiera Foley and Srishti Mangal, Eastlake High School