DECA and FBLA are business clubs that can help provide a great path out of college, but each club has differentiating benefits in some ways!

Distributive Education Clubs of America (DECA) and Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) are shifting into the competition season, highlighting the benefits of both business clubs. 

“I was just passionate about getting more involved in business. It wasn’t a career path that I had explored prior to joining these clubs,” Preethi Gurumurthi (11) said. “They’re pretty similar, but I think both of them have their nuances and offer different aspects of business, so you can really get experience out of both.”

From website design to business ethics, both clubs provide opportunities to students to find what they love. However, skills can go beyond the business sphere. 

“Just the idea of being on your feet, thinking on the spot, and just having a general awareness,” FBLA President Kabir Stravasta (12) said.

Every DECA event promotes quick thinking. Competitions revolve around roleplay- where each team is given a prompt and a certain amount of time to develop a solution based on their business knowledge. Although roleplays aren’t for everyone. FBLA also provides presentation and testing options. 

“It’s just good public speaking skills. I got valuable skills that I could use in any career path,” Gurumurthi said.

DECA districts were just two weeks ago, where 26 students advanced to the state level. In Colorado last year, there were around 500 students in general competing at state; therefore, making it to the national level will be a challenge for the competing students.

The FBLA district competition is later this school year, in February. 

“[The competitions] give me a lot of time to like talk to people, get to know them,” Kabir Stravasta said.

Competitions provide an accurate business experience. Competition, community, and connections are all promoted.

“You should definitely try it. I loved it and I never really planned to do anything related to business. I still want to go into medicine, but DECA and FBLA have been really valuable to me,” Gurumurthi said.