Basic Information

If this is your first year in DECA, welcome! It's always nice to have new members! If you're returning, welcome back : )

Whether you're just starting out or need a refresher, this page can help you out:

(p.s.: sorry ik its a lot to read but bear with me trust its helpful)

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To start, there are two main competitions you need to know: 

• SCDC in February

• ICDC in April

SCDC stands for the State Career Development Conference, and each state has one. In Nevada, our SCDC usually takes place in Vegas, where we stay at a hotel / resort for ~3 days and compete for our events. On the first day usually includes written events, while the second day includes role-plays and professional selling events. By the end of the second or third day, they reveal the awards and who will be going to ICDC. The really good thing is that you'll usually have a time slot for your events and you will spend no more than 1-2 hours doing your event. The rest of the day you can spend going to workshops they host, studying for your next event, or just hanging out with friends!

ICDC stands for the International Career Development Conference. It involves people all around the United States and in some other countries across the world. ICDC almost always takes place in the United States, and its where you go if you pass through the top ranks of your event in SCDC! This also means that not everyone who goes to SCDC will go to ICDC, so work hard to earn your place! This event usually takes a week and can also have fun events. For example, ICDC in the 24-25 season took place in Orlando, Florida, and students were able to go to Disney World! 

In DECA, you are able to take on a maximum of two events (the only exception is if your third event is virtual). One of your events has to be a series (role-play, case studies, etc.), and the other a written event (prepared before the event takes place in competition). In ICDC, however, you are only able to do one event.

If you've looked at the DECA website, you've probably noticed that there are sooooo many events! Don't worry though, here we'll briefly go through them and what each of them contain!

Cluster Information

There are six main clusters each event is part of: 

• Hospitality and Tourism 

• Business Management and Administration

• Entrepreneurship

• Finance

• Marketing

• Personal Financial Literacy 

In here, I will explain what each of these clusters mean:

Hospitality and Tourism - This cluster emphasizes knowledge management, market planning, and selling within the field of travel and hospitality jobs (such as restaurant, hotel, etc.). Events in this cluster is great for people who want to go into travel / tourism, lodging, event management, and restaurant management. 

Marketing - This cluster emphasizes channel management, pricing, promotion, and selling within the field of marketing jobs. Events in this cluster is great for people who want to go into marketing communications, marketing management, marketing research, merchandising, and professional selling.

Business Management + Administration - This cluster emphasizes knowledge management, project management, quality management, and risk management. Events in this cluster is great for people who want to go into administrative services, business / general management, HR, or operations management. 

Finance - This cluster emphasizes financial information management and risk management. Events in this cluster is great for people who want to go into accounting, banking services, corporate finance, insurance, and securities / investments. 

Entrepreneurship - This cluster is great for people who want to prepare a project before the competition and want to do something more generalized. Events in this cluster can emphasize business growth, franchise / international markets, start-ups, and usually involves making some kind of business plan for a new business or product. 

Personal Financial Literacy - This cluster is great for people who want to teach others about financial information thats important in everyday life such as budgeting, saving, spending, managing credit, income and assets, as well as financial literacy. There is only one competition event in this cluster (plus a virtual one), where you get to apply these skills in a role-play and an exam.

For each of these events, there will also be something called performance indicators. These performance indicators are VERY important to know when doing your event; they help you understand what the judges are looking for and, if followed, can help you gain a leg up in competition. Each event has their own set of indicators, and in total there's over 2250+! You don't have to memorize them or anything but just keep them in mind when doing your event. You can find these performance indicators in the page of your event in the right-hand side for most series and role-play events. 

Types of events

In DECA, there's two kinds of events: written projects and role-plays (which are usually a part of professional selling and series events). Each one is different in their own way and has different levels of preperation throughout: 

• Written Projects - these events usually consist of 20 slides or 20 paper-sized pages depending on the event. These kinds of events are in most, if not all, clusters (with the exception of P.F.L.). For these projects, you'll have to prepare something before the competition, usually 3-4 months in advance. It's important to note that the deadline for these projects is around mid January a month before the competition, so make sure you have ample time to prepare and submit. Along with your project you will also need to prepare a 15 minute presentation (but check the guidelines first!). The judges will usually stop you by the 15 minute mark, so make sure you know what you're saying during that time! Unlike most role-play events, there is no exam to take, and only the presentation is needed for these events. 

• Role-Plays - these events usually consist of an exam and a presentation to judges, where you will take part in a scenario (they will give you the scenario during competition) to showcase your skills and knowledge to the judges. Unlike written events, nothing needs to be prepared beforehand; just your mind! These role-plays require you to adapt and come up with things quickly depending on the scenario given. You can practice beforehand by watching youtube videos on role-plays (Bowtie GOAT on Youtube has amazing resources) and by reviewing scenarios from previous years. These events also have some kind of performance indicators, so look over those and remember that these are the skills the judges are looking for. Again, there is no need to memorize them or explicitly talk about them; just keep them in mind! 

Guidelines are also very important resources for these events and they can help you immensely, so PLEASE review them! They give you all the information you need about your event and tell you what to focus on.

Written events

The table of contents for these kinds of projects usually involve, but are not limited to: channels, customer segments, unique value proposition, revenue streams, etc. These events usually revolve around making a business or project idea. Depending on the event, this could simply just be hypothetical, or (especially for community giving projects or business growth plan) you might need to actually make / do the event or business.

For written events, some great resources for making your presentation include Canva and Google Slides. These two free sources can help give you a head start to your event. However, you are not limited to any one resource, so use whatever you'd like! It's also good to know some extra marketing and corporate finance knowledge before you do the event; this can help you when you do your event, and a bonus is that you'll ACTUALLY know what you're talking about!! (lol) 

There are plenty of templates you can use to help you get started! Many of them can be found on Canva itself, and for Google Slides https://slidesgo.com and https://slidescarnival.com are great resources! It's best if your paper is clean and concise, meaning it is organized and gets straight to the point. Otherwise, you can customize it however you'd like; just make sure to follow the guidelines! Oftentimes the papers that go into ICDC have personalization and branding that makes the product stand out, so make it your own.

When looking at the guidelines, in the very last page there is a rubric that is scored during your presentation. PLEASE review this before competition and it could help you a lot!! This is kind of like the performance indicators that are found in role-play events, where you'll need to keep these in mind when figuring out what to say to judges. 

PrincipLE events

For first-time DECA members, DECA has something known as principle events. These events are present in almost all of the clusters and revolve around understanding the basics. For example, in Priniciples of Entrepreneurship, you will need to learn basic concepts important to business owners and entrepreneurs. The key is to be able to show your knowledge in an understandable, easy-to-digest way for your audience. Like many other role-play events, principles events involve some kind of scenario that they give you during the competition. For example, you may have to play the role of a watch repair owner who has to explain why good customer service skills are important to an employee (the judge). Oftentimes, you are explaining an important business concept to a "client", who is the judge themselves. They will usually only give you 10 minutes, but you will have time to prepare beforehand with pencil and paper during the competition, so get ready and know what you will bring up!  Remember that this is only for first-time DECA members. You cannot do principles the year after that. 

Thanks for reading! If you have any more questions or concerns, check out the "resources" page on this website! There's a lot of good sources that can help you prepare for your events. The "tips to succeed" can also help. GOOD LUCK AND YOU GOT THIS!!!