The importance of the entire fish – scales and all
Making a difference
June 10, 2024
WAUSAU – Two Wausau West students recently found themselves in the spotlight – taking home first place in the School-Based Enterprise (SBE) category at the International Career Development Conference in Anaheim, California.
It’s a win that now-senior Sadie Steinbach said validated all the hard work she and recent Wausau West graduate Jackson Albee had put in over the 2023-24 school year.
The students are part of DECA, an international association with more than 259,000 members that prepares emerging entrepreneurs in marketing, finance, hospitality and business management and administration.
“(DECA) helps students learn how to properly function in a professional setting,” Steinbach said.
Carl Hert, marketing teacher and DECA & SBE advisor, said the association is meant for students at all different skill levels.
“It helps students in the professional world, whether it would be getting that next job, helping students present to another adult, putting together a presentation, to network – and give them that next level up,” he said. “It challenges everybody.”
The competition, Hert said, was a cumulation of the work students put in over the last year.
Albee and Steinbach won first place for their manual and presentation on West-Side Connection – the school store, which the two co-manage at Wausau West High School.
The West-Side Connection
The West-Side Connection, Steinbach said, started 23 years ago and is 100% run by students.
The store, she said, sells various items – from Wausau West Warriors apparel to snacks and candy to, what Steinbach said is a fan favorite, Bubbl’r.
Some of the manager responsibilities Albee and Steinbach had with the store included keeping it stocked, picking up bulk items, keeping it clean, choosing merchandise and making sure everything was running smoothly.
At the beginning of the year, Hert said Albee and Steinbach also trained the 175 new employees on how to operate the cash register and the online payment platform, Square.
“That work experience has helped (with their) customer service (skills),” Hert said. “A lot of students maybe don’t have a job outside of high school, but yet they can list this – they get credit for class for working in the store.”
Steinbach also started an Instagram account for the store this year, which Hert said quickly gained a large following.
“It’s funny and campy,” he said. “It picked up a lot of momentum.”
The store, Hert said, provides students with real-life experience instead of him just showing an example business.
“It’s a powerful learning tool for the students and myself as well,” he said.
Preparing for competition
Another important aspect of DECA, Steinbach said, is the competitions students participate in.
They happen at the local, state and international level.
Before a chapter can compete, it must be gold-certified, which involves submitting a 25-page manual on selected topics.
This year, the topics were product service management, selling and finance.
Steinbach said she, Albee and Bennet Matteson (who also helps manage West-Side Connection) divided and conquered the manual starting in June of last year.
The group said they submitted their manual in January, were gold certified in February and began working on their presentation – another aspect of the competition.
Steinbach said the judges chose one out of the three topics from the manual for students to present on – product service management.
“Jackson and I then got to work on creating our slides (for the presentation),” she said. “We talked about our vendors, our merchandise assortment, our stock turnover, reduction, retail and we created slides about our store in general.”
From there, the duo said they competed at the state level, made it to finals, came in first and then went back to perfecting their presentation for internationals.
And, in Anaheim, she said the competition process played out the same: present, make it to finals and come in first for SBE out of more than 300 different groups.
A feat, Hert said he has never seen in his 25 years of teaching.
‘The stars aligned’
Steinbach said all the hard work she and Albee put into their manual and presentation was worth it when they heard their names announced on stage.
“Jackson and I put in hours of work – we were there almost every morning before school for months working on and perfecting our presentation,” she said. “(We were) working on how we were interacting with each other – just all the small details. Seeing the fruits of our labor felt great.”
The win, Steinbach said, was a big deal to her and Albee, as well as their entire team.
To have all 16 students in their chapter at the final ceremony, which was two hours long, Steinbach said, “was an amazing feeling that we had everyone supporting us and standing behind us.”
“And then when we were up there and we got first… our whole chapter started screaming and everyone rushed the stage and hugged us,” she said. “They got silly string and sparkling cider, and we were all celebrating. It was truly the best feeling to win, not only for me and Jackson, but for our team… there was no better feeling in my opinion.”
Hert said the “stars aligned” for Albee and Steinbach’s win.
“They have an amazing dynamic between them… they’re total opposites,” he said. “They feed off each other.”
Steinbach said she and Albee are neighbors and have grown up together, which allowed them to read each other’s emotions and balance one another out while competing.
In addition to the natural dynamic, Hert said putting in the extra effort and honing in on every aspect of the presentation was crucial to Albee and Steinbach’s win.
“They had to make it fun,” he said. “They had to make it campy. They had to make it something that someone who is going to watch 20 presentations is still going to be interested in their presentation.”
Taking the critiques they received at the state competition and tweaking their presentation for internationals, Hert said, also helped them seal the deal.
Normally, he said when students come in first at state, they don’t feel the need to change anything with their presentation or continue to practice – “that’s 99% of the experience I had with students.”
“It was the exact opposite with Jackson and Sadie,” he said. “They took the judges’ comments and they changed their presentation to what the judges wanted to see.”
For example, when Albee and Steinbach were presenting, Hert said they mentioned how they overcame running out of the disposable cups they use for their slushies – and were in a situation where they didn’t have time to go get more from a store.
The managers created their own buzzword – BYO12C (or, bring your own 12-ounce cup) – and posted it to their Instagram, letting their followers know if they brought their own cup, they would get a discount on their slushie.
“It was a huge success,” Hert said. “The judge liked it and said, ‘why don’t you talk about sustainability?’ They redid their presentation to fit what the judge wanted.”
Coming in first place, Hert said, “validated everything we do every day.”
“They 100% deserve it – it was such a big win for our chapter and our school, too,” he said.
Fostering future professionals
High school students who participate in DECA, Hert said, learn a variety of skills that will carry them one step ahead in their future professional endeavors.
“There’s all different sides of DECA,” he said. “There’s the community (aspect), where we give back $5,000 to Make a Wish Wisconsin… to sponsor somebody in our local community.”
Additionally, Hert said their chapter also donates money to help the food pantry at Wausau West.
Career exploration is another benefit he said gets students out of their comfort zone and talking with professionals.
DECA, Hert said, also provides an “industry touch point,” that not everyone gets while in high school.
“One area you can compete in is sports and event marketing,” he said. “You get to sit down and do a role play… and you would sit down with somebody that works with the Green Bay Gamblers, (for example), and pitch your idea to them. I think that’s valuable.”
Networking, time management and professionalism, Hert said, are also skills students can learn through DECA.
“It’s the little things, such as introducing yourself to somebody, how to properly shake hands, how to properly close the sale and how to properly follow up,” he said. “A lot of businesses say it’s all about the soft skills – it’s hard to teach that – and I think DECA does an amazing job with grabbing that and bringing that back in.”
Steinbach said not only has DECA sharpened her professional skills, her teamwork abilities and her own time management – it also put her on the path for what she wants to pursue when she graduates from Wausau West in 2025.
“Now, I know that I want to go into business, and I know so many people who have decided they want to do something with business or marketing after joining DECA,” she said.
A bright future ahead
With the 2023-24 school year complete, Hert said both students have bright futures ahead of them.
Albee is heading to the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse in the fall to study marketing.
Steinbach will be entering her senior year as a Warrior.
She said it was great for her and Albee to watch West-Side Connection “go out with a bang,” as the store will be moving to a larger location within the school and rebranding.
“We’re completely rebranding our store,” she said.
The new space, Hert said, will have twice the amount of room.
“We’re excited about that,” he said. “It was a great way to end the 2023 year run.”
To learn more about DECA’s Wausau West chapter, visit its Instagram page at wwdeca or its Facebook page at Wausau West DECA.
