On the weekend of March 2, McLean’s DECA team competed in Virginia’s state competition in Virginia Beach. Senior Aditya Bendre had the most impressive performance with a second place finish in the Principles of Business Management and Administration category. The team as a whole had 16 medalists, one of them being senior officer Nico Christofferson.

“I’m proud of the team’s energy and performance,” Christofferson said. “We came together to support each other, and we were all cheering when we saw each other up on the stage. However, we did have many kids one to three spots away from qualifying for ICDC.”

Despite a few students barely missing out on the DECA International Career Development Conference (ICDC), five students did qualify, which is an improvement on last year’s three.

“Preparation for internationals is similar to states, just in a smaller group,” DECA sponsor Debra Dove said. “There will be more concentration on the test portion of the events as this can make or break a competitor’s chances in the competition.”

ICDC is the culmination of the worldwide DECA season and will have around ten thousand participants. It will run from April 27 to April 30 in Anaheim, California.