Lemont’s FBLA chapter totals 20 top three finishes in regional competition

Lemont High School’s chapter of the Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) placed among the top three in 20 of its 22 events at the Central Northern Area Conference regional, which was held virtually on January 16. Students in Lemont’s FBLA chapter were among more than 170 competitors representing eight Chicago-area high schools.

The top three finishers in each event earn the opportunity to participate at the 2021 FBLA State Leadership Conference, which will be held virtually on Saturday, March 27.

Lemont students placed first in three team competitions and seven individual events. Senior Devin Shah and junior Safin Saraiya triumphed in Sales Presentation, juniors Jayne Pelen and Jackie Wencl won in Social Media Strategies, and freshmen Casey Treanor and Natalia Zagata captured Computer Game & Simulation Programming. Individual winners included senior Sean Abbott (Organizational Leadership), juniors Zach Etzkorn (Agribusiness), Gracie Meloni (Impromptu Speaking) and Melissa Nunez (Public Speaking), sophomores Sebastian Delatorre (Spreadsheet Applications) and Julia Janowski (3D Animation), and freshman Lydia Pelen (Introduction to Social Media Strategy).

Juniors Miriam Hagen and Reena Sethi teamed for second place in Business Ethics, while freshmen Riley Conry and Adyson DuVall paired for a runner-up finish in Introduction to Business Presentation, and freshmen Rehan Saraiya and Arjun Vicharapu were second in Marketing. Juniors Joe Bartman (Business Calculations) and Bryce Sadelski (Personal Finance), sophomore Jack Madera (Supply Chain Management), and freshmen Carter Lee (Website Design) and Kylie Meloni (Graphic Design) all picked up individual runner-up finishes.

Junior Alec Yaagoub (Economics) and freshman Gabriella Abbott (Introduction to Business Procedures) each earned third-place finishes.

Lemont’s FBLA chapter won at least one event state title in eight of 10 years from 2010-19, and has captured multiple championships six times, including a school-record five state titles in both 2011 and 2016. Martynas Juskelis ‘18, Anna Mietus ‘19 and Alex Paulius ‘18 each won three state titles in their careers, while Spenser Bailey ‘16, Danny Banas ‘11 and Krystian Paszek ‘11 won two each.

The FBLA is the largest business career student organization in the world, and includes 215,000 students worldwide in its high school division. Illinois’ chapter of the FBLA may be found on the Web at www.ilfbla.org. Lemont’s FBLA chapter is sponsored by teacher John Aspel.