Getting down to business

The Creston Community High School Future Business Leaders of America made history after earning a third place finish in the Lloyd V. Douglas Chapter of the Year award during this year’s State Leadership Conference Saturday over virtual means.

“This is our tenth year as a reactivated chapter, so it was a big year for us anyway,” said business instructor and FBLA advisor Shannon Smith. “Then, all these changes happened, and I’m really proud of how all the kids adjusted to it.

State leadership conference

“We were supposed to have the conference in person on March 26 through March 28,” said Smith. “Ten days before we were supposed to go, we moved it to virtual.”

The move to virtual wasn’t all bad, said Smith, as it provided students with a unique business experience never taught in classrooms.

“All the events looked a little different, and we had to make adjustments,” said Smith. “They learned some different business skills along the way with having to do stuff virtually, just like a lot of other people in the business world at the moment.”

Students in group projects worked together over Zoom, where they were also able to record presentations.

“There was a bit of a learning curve, but the kids figured it out and we got stuff turned in,” said Smith.

Some students, such as junior Brittney Rink, who received placed first in both individual public speaking and a group social media campaign with Jurnee Harvey, said the virtual environment had it’s benefits, and said she was just glad the event was able to occur in the first place.

“The experience was different this year with it being virtual, but it definitely gave me more time to prepare and gave me more overall opportunity to do better in the events,” said Rink. “The experience was overall positive and I’m grateful the organization was still able to hold the conference.”

During the competition, Creston FBLA had individuals or groups place in 26 of the events competed in, with a handful of first, second and third place finishes. Smith said this success is particularly impressive considering over half of the team were new to FBLA.

“I only had four seniors that participated, so a lot of them were underclassmen who hadn’t really ever done state before, so this is a first in another way for them since they’ve never really competed before,” said Smith.

Gannon Greenwalt, a freshman member, placed first in Introduction to Financial Math and fifth in Personal Finance, as well as a first place finish in a group community service project with seniors Camden Peterson and Spencer Lane. He said his initial year has left an impact on him.

“It was a great first experience for me, and FBLA is a great organization,” said Greenwalt.

A third place finish

Creston FBLA’s performance this year earned them the Iowa Merit award, which is given to chapters involved with their community.

“You have to write a chapter report, you have to get sponsorships for the conference, you have to participate in so much community service or fundraising events,” said Smith. “Anyone who has the designation of Iowa Merit is in the running for the Lloyd V. Douglas award, which is for the top chapters at the state.”

Out of the 22 Iowa FBLA Chapters, Creston FBLA’s earned enough points to place third for the Lloyd V. Douglas Chapter of the Year award, marking the second time Creston FBLA has earned this honor.

“The highest we’ve ever gotten for this was sixth back in 2014,” said Smith.

The places are calculated by how many people for a chapter place in an event, with higher placing earning higher points for the chapter. Smith said that along with the member’s skills, Creston FBLA had numbers on their side.

“We’re not the biggest school district that’s involved with FBLA by any means, but this last year we had a huge recruitment year and membership increase,” said Smith. “I didn’t find out until state conference that we are the second largest chapter in the state.”

Smith said the secret to the chapter’s success was the recruitment effort by the upperclassmen, and their commitment to keeping members excited about FBLA.

“Even though there weren’t a lot of seniors that competed at the virtual conference, we had a very large group of four-year members who have really promoted this to other kids,” said Smith. “They knew in order to keep things going, they needed to help recruit, and we recruited a huge Freshman class.”

“It was really exciting,” said four-year member Spencer Lane. “We had a lot of young members do really well and that helped the chapter a lot. There is definitely a future for the chapter.”

With the school year coming to a close and another trophy in the case, Smith said even she was surprised by the success, and she said she believes it has raised the bar for the future of Creston FBLA.

“We always watched the other groups go up and accept that award, and the kids were always like ‘How do we get that Ms. Smith?’” said Smith. “I honestly didn’t think we wouldn’t get to this point by ten years in. I thought it would take maybe 15 years of being reactivated before we could get to this.”