On Mar. 8-10, 28 Hellgate students travelled to Billings for the Business Professionals of America (BPA) State Leadership Conference. There, students participated in many competitions including financial concepts, business management, presentations, and more.
“[BPA] is a competition-based club…if you compete, you earn more professional and workplace-based skills, but you can also earn those from being in the club, from running the school store and participating,” explained Junior Petra Serban, Hellgate BPA Officer. “In terms of competitions…you can choose whatever you compete at.”.
There are eight Assessment Areas from which students can choose events to compete in, and, with each including around 12 events, there are over 90 categories. These events fall into larger sections: judged events, team events, and occupational and specialized events.
BPA is set up like any other competition: “There’s three levels, regional, state, and national level. You move up through the levels based on how well you do in your events,” said Serban.
BPA State Leadership Conference is a huge convention. “There’s usually about 1,000 people there each year. There’s eight regions in Montana, so you’re competing against all those regions,” said Serban. This year, 36 Hellgate students qualified to compete at the state level, though only 28 attended.
Sophomore Bonnie Groenenboom also competed at the state level and explained how it works. “Mostly all the judged events were on the first day. You can also compete in tests, which you can do [at school] before the competition and see if you qualify,” said Groenenboom. Most tests in BPA are open events, meaning that they can be taken at any time without qualification to each higher level.
“In [virtual events] … you automatically compete against the entire nation, so you don’t go through regionals and state and just submit it for nationals,” said Serban.
The Knights’ goal was to make it past the state level to compete at the National Leadership Conference. The top three in judged events, the top three in team events, and the top five in occupational and specialized events will qualify for the national level.
At the state level, Groenenboom placed third in an occupational event, Interview Skills, and Serban placed fourth in an open event. Both of these accomplishments will take them to the National Leadership Conference. Additionally, a Hellgate team including Serban, Jasper and Kieran Alviar, and Lucy Schoenen placed in the top 10 for a virtual event which will also move them onto the national level.
Overall, 17 Hellgate students qualified for the National Leadership Conference, which will take place on May 6-10 in Nashville, Tennessee.
