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Students representing three Fremont Unified School District (FUSD) high schools took home top awards across numerous categories at the 2022 DECA International Career Development Conference (ICDC), held April 23-26 in Atlanta.

“Our students did an outstanding job against skilled international teams,” said FUSD Superintendent CJ Cammack. “Their achievements demonstrate the leadership, career readiness and collaboration our world-class educators support students to gain and practice in FUSD. I send my congratulations to the students, teams and advisors for their success.”

Four FUSD high schools sent teams to Georgia for ICDC, where over 18,500 students from around the world gathered to compete. 

Washington High School students and DECA advisor Vincent Wu at 2022 ICDC. (Photo courtesy of Vincent Wu)

"After the cancellation of the 2020 ICDC and the virtual nature of the 2021 ICDC, the greatest gift for me was to see the students gather in person,” said Vincent Wu, DECA Advisor and math and business teacher at Washington High School. “Not only to see them thrive in competition, but to also see the joy in their faces as they met people from all around the world and interacted with them.”

“Just being able to meet everybody was a great experience,” said Rhea Jain, an 11th grade student and DECA member from Washington High School. “I got to meet people from Wisconsin, from Montana, even from China and Spain.”

DECA programs aim to prepare high school and college students around the world to become leaders and entrepreneurs in marketing, finance, hospitality and management. 

“The students gained insurmountable skills as they applied their knowledge in business, math, marketing and public speaking in a real-world application - something that career technical student organizations uniquely provide,” said Wu. 

“Joining DECA allowed me to explore so many new pathways and horizons that I didn’t think were possible, for example: business, hospitality, marketing, so many skills that I learned just by joining this club,” said Jain. “And actually, it influenced my own decision to try and pursue a business major in college, just because I joined DECA.”

Students qualified for the international competition by placing in the top four or five in a category at the state-level competition; California’s highly-competitive conference was in February. Both Irvington and Washington high schools sent their largest delegation to date to ICDC.

FUSD students took home top 10 international awards in a variety of categories. 

FUSD congratulates and appreciates the high school teachers who support students as DECA advisors: Marisa Leonarduzzi of American, Alberto Ballado of Irvington, Bellamy Liu of Mission, and Vincent Wu of Washington. 

Click here to find award ceremony videos from DECA.