Hillsdale High BPA wins five regional medals

Home City News Hillsdale High BPA wins five regional medals

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It was 5 a.m. Jan. 8 when members of the Hillsdale High School chapter of Business Professionals of America started towards Dearborn, Michigan. Fifteen hours later they returned to Hillsdale with five regional gold medals and 25 state qualifiers, and earlier this month it was announced that junior Vice President Alexis Higgins won the Michigan BPA state theme competition.

The BPA competition at Henry Ford Community College in Dearborn, Michigan attracted more than 800 students from 28 BPA Michigan chapters. The 50 different events ranged from graphic design to parliamentary procedure.

Four of the five gold medals collected by Hillsdale were in individual events. Seniors Lindsey Foust, Samuel McArthur, Martin Petersen, and Victor Ybarra won gold in human resource management, graphic design promotion, prepared speech, and entrepreneurship respectively.

“We have added some new members this year, so we had to try out some new things. Before we were only doing events that we had experience with, but we joined some new events this year and it went well,”  said Mindy Eggleston, the group’s faculty adviser.

Hillsdale also won a team gold medal in parliamentary procedure with a team consisting of  sophomore Braxten Boyd, senior Brock Eves, senior Charles Holbrook, junior Janel Kast, junior Olivia Nolan, senior Martin Petersen, senior Olivia Rumler, and junior Emma Shreffler.

In parliamentary procedure, a group of eight students is given an agenda and it must prepare a business meeting in 15 minutes then present to two judges. They are expected to discuss business ideas, make formal motions, and conduct votes.

“This event really forces you to work as a team and be efficient,” Holbrook said. “We have even been able to take some of the things we’ve learned and use it to help us run our student council meetings more effectively.”

Petersen, who serves as chapter president, noted that BPA offers a unique type of competition as well as an insightful experience in the world of business.

“It’s always fun to compete, be it on the court or in front of the judges,” Petersen said. “In addition BPA puts you in business-like situations that you could actually find yourself in someday.”

Both Petersen and Holbrook plan to attend Hillsdale College in the fall.

Hillsdale also placed second in five events: sophomore Breanna Bildner in fundamental word processing, junior Rebecca Butters in both graphic design promotion and economic research promotion, senior Brock Eves in entrepreneurship, and sophomore Chloe Page in basic office systems.

“It’s great to see such success with the group,” Petersen said. “When I started doing this two years ago we had about 30 members, and now we have almost 60. Our numbers just keep growing.”

This success comes on the heels of another very exciting moment for Hillsdale BPA: Higgin’s award-winning BPA state theme competition.

The state theme competition, held annually, allows students to submit a theme design to be featured on the cover of the state conference programs.

“This is a big deal,” Eggleston said in a press release. “About 30 students enter each year and Alexis is the first student from Hillsdale to win the contest.”

Higgins’ design features the outline of Michigan with a variety of business catchphrases printed throughout. The BPA color scheme of navy, tan and red is also prominent and represents leadership, professionalism, opportunity, and teamwork.

The club hopes to continue its success at the state conference held March 17-20 at the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel in Grand Rapids.