International success for East and West DECA!

May 5, 2025

Twenty-two Smithtown East and West DECA students recently competed with more than 23,000 students at the DECA International Career Conference, held in Orlando, Florida. Students had to qualify for the competition by placing at the state level in Rochester in March.

The HS East School Store, also known as the Bull Market, was recognized for the second year as a Gold Certified School Based Enterprise (SBE). Brendan Thatcher and Jase Heffernan, both competed in the SBE Competition where they had to analyze and report on the promotion, financial and entrepreneurial aspect of the East Bull Market. Brendand and Jase created a 35 page manual that highlighted various aspects of the Bull Market such as promotion, financial statements, operations, pricing, distribution, selling and human resources. Once in Orlando, they attended an SBE Workshop to network with other school store managers and later competed against thousands of other school store managers by delivering a presentation highlighting the important topic of product management. This is the second time competing in the SBE competition, and receiving Gold Certification! Congratulations Brendan and Jase!

HSE's Mateo Boyd Lenard and Tyler Popko received a Top 10 in the Nation Semi-Finalist Medal in the Hospitality Services Team Decision Making Event and advanced to the Final round for their competition. Mateo also received a Top 10 Medal for his high score on the Hospitality and Tourism exam. In addition to the exam, Mateo and Tyler competed in a role play situation where they had to assume the roles of a marketing and sales manager for Bounty Resort and create a plan to market the resort as a “buddymoon” destination. Mateo and Tyler had 30 minutes to analyze the case study and prepare their response and then presented their idea to the judge. They had to use critical thinking, problem solving, communication, collaboration, creativity and innovation skills while in Orlando and competed against thousands of other students from around the globe. Congratulations Mateo and Tyler on an amazing accomplishment of being DECA International Semi-Finalists!

DECA students