Thirteen out of 14 students are advancing to the Delta Epsilon Chi and Distributive Education Clubs of America (DECA) state competition. This is the most students that have made state since Lee Geffert became the RHS DECA sponsor four years ago.

DECA is a student organization that trains emerging leaders and entrepreneurs in business, marketing, finance and hospitality. There are over 46 competitive events that students compete in about marketing, finance, and hospitality. Texas DECA is the largest DECA association in the world with over 14,000 members across the state. On January 20th, the Richardson High School DECA team competed at the district conference which took place at North Garland High School.

“I’m very proud,” Geffert said. “I’m very proud of the leadership that’s been put in place with our DECA officers. We’ve had really good leadership. They’ve really come together and they’re pushing themselves to be better. The more time that they put in, the better they’re gonna be.”

Four years ago, the RHS DECA chapter was very small but has grown to be the eighth largest chapter in Texas and one of the top 25 in the world.

“Each year that I’ve been here we’ve grown and built on to what we did the year before,” Geffert said. “This year is looking very strong – we have 13 people competing at state this year and I expect at least half of them to advance to international competition. Unfortunately, state competition is the hardest to advance out of. The state of Texas is the largest organization of DECA anywhere in the world. We have over 5,000 students that will be competing in February for the title of the best.”

First-year DECA member, senior Anna Li, competed in the business finance series and advanced to state.

“I was very anxious – a lot of people were,” Li said. “We were waiting and awards went on for like an hour because there were so many people there. I was nervous until I got my reward. It felt great finding out that I made state. However, there’s a lot more work to be done and I need to keep on studying.”

The DECA State Conference takes place from February 20th to the 22nd, 2018 at the Dallas Sheraton Hotel located in Downtown Dallas.