![After placing second in their respective LDEs at the Capital District contest in early November, freshman Jesus Jaramillo-Gallegos and freshman Wyatt Pickett will compete at the Area XII LDE contest in Georgetown on Nov. 23. Jaramillo-Gallegos is competing in Greenhand Spanish Creed Speaking, while Pickett’s LDE is Greenhand Creed Speaking. “Honestly, [I’m excited for] just traveling around, maybe meeting more people,” Jaramillo-Gallegos said. “And [I’m] nervous about probably just not being able to define my weak areas. I feel like I did decent for my first time ever doing this. I just think it’s fun.”](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Navy-and-Yellow-Simple-Group-Project-Presentation-1200x675.png)
![Holding up T-wolves, the tour group poses for a picture in the Chinese classroom. Sophomore Lydia Ou, junior Phu Trung and senior Yushan Pan gave a tour to Taiwanese diplomat Andrea Yang on Nov. 8. “I was so excited when I heard I would get to give the tour because it’s a big deal,” Ou said. “She’s from the US embassy for Taiwan, so she’s really important. I’m so privileged [to get this opportunity] and I’m so excited.” Photo by Skyler King](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Main-Taiwan.jpg)
![Smiling at the camera, sophomore Olivia Mahlmeister and seniors Samantha Jameson, Adhit Eswaramoorthi and Justin Khadavi celebrate completing first chamber in the Congress Meet. All four students advanced to the final chamber. “Out of the 20 kids in the final chamber, we had a seventh, ninth, 11th and 13th, and they took the top four to move on to state,” AP US History and Debate teacher Josh Marsh said. “[Even though] we didn't make state this year, all four of them moving on [and] placing is phenomenal.” Photo courtesy of Josh Marsh](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/2024-Regional-Congress-Team.jpg)
![Holding the Grand Nationals trophies, drum majors Helashi Wijayawardhana, Abigail Pettey and Eddy Kim pose for a photo. The BOA Grand Nationals competition took place in Indianapolis on Nov. 14-17. “My favorite thing was just looking back at the field, and I was like, ‘Oh, crap. I know all of their names, I know who all of them are’,” Wijayawardahana said. “It's just insane to me that I was able to make so many connections. [Being a drum major] taught me how to build relationships with people who I’m not really that similar to, and how to juggle a ton of things all together.”
Photo courtesy of CPHS Band SmugMug](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/AJC.GrandNatsFinals-169-1200x801.jpg)
![Standing in front of a small audience, senior Kimberley Walters shares a social criticism poem titled “Pity the Nation” by Lawrence Felinghetti. Every month, sponsored by the poetry club, the library hosts a poetry reading. “I never thought I would be interested in [poetry readings] because I’m not the biggest poetry fan,” Walters said. “I think poetry is a very succinct way to express feelings and get a story across. Whereas lots of books have a span of a whole story, but it’s put in a lot of words. The power of poetry is that you can be so succinct within, and there’s a lot of power within the words that are used.”](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/KIM-1200x800.jpg)
![Smiling at the camera, Author Ehigbor Okosun, members of Page Turners, and other students reflect on the author's visit. “I thought the visit was great,” Senior Amia De Leon said. “It was interesting talking to her and [getting to know] her process and her thoughts and books in general. But I think the reason it went well [was that] people got to ask questions. I'm glad that she said so much in response to the questions and it wasn't just one and done. [The author’s responses] felt very articulate.”](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Sebastian-5-1200x800.jpg)
![Delicately placing the string to form the shape of a cornucopia, seniors Haley Burton and Avery Nelson create the November arrangement for the Flower of the Month Club. This club is led by Advanced Floral Design Students and provides a monthly arrangement to community members who subscribe to receive them. “I think flower of the month club is a really impactful way to show your loved ones ‘hey I really care about you,’ or even if they’re just for yourself, they’re a little pick-me-up throughout the month that [say] ‘I’m doing ok, and these flowers make my day a little bit brighter,” Nelson said. “I like giving people flowers because people value the flowers more and they value themselves more.”](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Ava-Holmes-3-edit.jpg)
![Standing in front of the field at a freshman football game, cheerleader freshman Jacob Gaudreau along with teammate freshman Bella Gibson pose for a photo during halftime of game. “[Cheer has] definitely given me a much more outgoing personality,” Gaudreau said. “I used to be very introverted, so it's definitely made me more extroverted towards people.”](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Ingrid-204-1200x800.jpg)
![Holding a wooden pizza toy, senior Taylor Peterson plays with small children in Bucaramanga, Colombia. During the summer, Peterson traveled to Colombia to help build an elementary school that only had two classrooms but five or six grades with one teacher. “We add[ed] two more classrooms,” Peterson said. “It’s kind of hard when you have two or three grades in one classroom and you only have one teacher. It’s very hard to actually get some beneficial learning. [The extra classrooms will give the students] a better quality of education because they’ll actually have a place specific for their learning.” Photo by Taylor Peterson](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Taylor-P.png)
![Sucking in a breath of air, freshman Lily Pope competes in the 200 yard individual medley. On Oct. 25, the swim team competed in the AISD Swim Invitational. Overall, the girls team took second place and the boys team came in eleventh. “My favorite stroke is butterfly because I do the best in that stroke,” Pope said. “I feel like [butterfly] can test how [your ability] to convince yourself to keep going. The hardest part of swimming is convincing yourself to stay strong and keep pushing during a hard race [when] everything is tired.”](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/POPE-1200x804.jpg)
![Swinging with his arm extended, senior Nolan Park hits the ball smoothly over the net and to the opponent’s side. Park is one of four varsity tennis captains and helped the team win district championships. “Winning district champs was a pretty awesome feeling,” Park said. “We had lost to Liberty Hill a couple of weeks before, but when we played them [again], we came out and really took care of business. We took them out and it was just a really awesome night.”](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Kassidy-419.jpg)
![Standing proud, varsity senior athletes Rafael Escobar, Griffin Jacobs, Jakob Martin, and juniors Jackson Springer and Jack Morris pose with their newly earned medals. The varsity team finished third out of 14 teams on Sept. 25. “The team's primary goal is to win the district championship,” head coach Cody Price said. "We're confident that with our action plan in place, we can accomplish this mission. [For the next tournament], our preparation involves assessing our strengths and weaknesses, celebrating milestones and creating individual development plans." Photo courtesy of Cody Price](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/golf.jpg)
DECA’d Out
Seventeen DECA Students Advance to State, Prepare for Competition
After competing on Jan. 19, DECA competitors line up to pose.
February 20, 2019
At 4:30 a.m. on Jan. 19, 21 students arrived at the student pick up circle to board a bus to the Bastrop Convention Center, where the TX District five DECA’s Career Development Conference was to be held. Serving DECA Chapters in 28 counties, District 5 holds almost 1200 students, with only 54 percent of those advancing to State. This year, 17 of 21 students from Cedar Park’s DECA Chapter advanced in various events from Hospitality & Tourism to Sports Management and Community Service.
Within the competitive events, there are primarily two types: Roleplay or Written. The roleplay events are on the spot events that are completed either individually or as a team of two, where people don’t know the prompt they will receive and use to effectively come up with a solution related to their event category. These events typically have an exam portion to it prior to competition day, and competitors are tested over different business concepts.
As a first year DECA competitor, sophomore Suparna Swaroop competed in Principles of Marketing, and said that her dad, along with her DECA Advisor Kimberly Stapleton, helped her practice for competition. Her event is a roleplay, where she is in an interview setting and gets a prompt from a judge with 10 minutes to prepare. Swaroop said that the prompts relate to marketing and business management, and that she is judged on how she handles different scenarios.
Swaroop said she is excited about advancing to State, and that her public speaking skills helped her get to where she is.
“I’m looking forward to going to State and meeting new people,” Swaroop said. “Advancing to State is a really good opportunity to work even harder and improve so I’m excited about it all. A huge portion of my event is interview skills, confidence and my overall speaking style. Therefore, presentations and public speeches in school have greatly helped my event today.”
Similar to Swaroop, senior Alessandro Mauries competed in a roleplay event, except this time with his partner senior Connor Jerman. They competed in Sports and Entertainment Marketing Team Decision Making, where they were given 30 minutes to evaluate and come up with a professional business proposal for a unique scenario, such as a way of promoting a charity sports event. Mauries said they prepared by practicing different prompts and worked on presenting effectively.
“We work on hitting all of the indicators that we are asked to present to our judge and talk clear and smooth, passing points and ideas between my partner and me,” Mauries said.
According to Mauries, the experience he gained from his job has helped him with this event, and he said that he is eager to compete at the state level.
“Working at Twin Creeks Country Club for two and a half years has really helped me be successful in this club,” Mauries said. “I would consider myself a very sociable person and a clear speaker. I have had times that I have had to make intimidating approaches to my elders or people above me in my actual workplace. Advancing to State is such an opportunity that we earned. My partner and I are very eager to compete at the next level. I believe that we have a lot more practicing to do for sure if we want to advance.”
While Mauries and Swaroop are both first-time competitors, senior Ashley Hibbets advanced to State last year, and did so once again this year with a different partner, junior Johnathan Khadivi. They competed in Travel and Tourism Team Decision Making, where they were are given 30 minutes on the spot to prepare, and 10 minutes to present to a judge on a scenario related to solving something within a travel and tourism-based company. She said that she and her partner had to prepare for any possible scenario, which meant having to think outside of the box in order to grab the judges’ attention.
“For my event, we are given a prompt that’s usually about a travel company or business that has hired us to develop a promotional or marketing plan,” Hibbetts said. “Basically, we have to develop new and innovative ways to attract customers towards these businesses.”
Hibbets said that the State competition is a great way to meet new people from all over Texas who share the same interests in business and are all very talented. Although Hibbetts has had previous experience with competing, she said being in Capstone has helped her with competing.
“Being in Capstone the past two years has really helped me with DECA competitions,” Hibbets said. “I had to learn how to confidently present in front of small and large crowds and that experience made me much more prepared to present to a judge. Since it wasn’t my first time having to give a presentation to someone, I was able to focus more on the details of the event, not on how to address it.”
Roleplay events are graded based on a 100 question multiple choice test and their presentation, while written events allow for more flexibility and the competitors know exactly what they are presenting about. Depending on the event, competitors will write a paper of five, 11, or 20 pages, and will give a presentation based on that. Senior Kristin Knight competed in the Integrated Marketing Campaign–Product, in which she and her teammates, seniors Roshini Krishnaswamy and Vaniya Khan, chose a product and had to write an effective paper and present a plan on marketing it.
“We had to research and pick a product in the marketplace today,” Knight said. “We chose Bangs, a shoe company that was founded around social change, and we had to write a paper with our research and marketing ideas, and had to create a presentation board to pitch our plan at competition.”
Knight said that she is looking forward to State competition with her friends and that the classes and clubs she has taken have helped her greatly.
“Advancing to state for me is very exciting because it’s kind of a validation of all the work we put in,” Knight said. “We didn’t expect it to happen and when it did, it was exciting, especially since it’s our senior year and I’m able to go to state and be with friends and know that our work led to this. The business classes I’ve taken have helped me, and also competing in other clubs like FCCLA and HOSA have helped me because I know what it is like to compete in a convention and be professional.”
From Feb. 21 to Feb. 23 DECA competitors will be at the competition in Dallas, TX, with all of the state’s DECA Chapters. Winners will then advance to the International Career Development Conference (ICDC) held in Orlando, FL in April.
