Eastlake Deca students mean business

Every Wednesday night, Kim Villeneuve's living room becomes a makeshift Deca class, and 18 Eastlake High School students squeeze onto a couch and listen to presentations made by local business executives.

For more than three years, Villeneuve and other parents have tried to persuade the Eastlake High School administration to take over these marketing and business classes so students can get class credit.

Villeneuve and the students say they want what other high schools in the area already have — a school-sanctioned Deca program for class credit. Students also want their transcripts to show they took Deca classes when they apply for college.

Deca is an international association that offers programs that complement classroom curriculum and help to build marketing and management skills.

For instance, Eastlake Deca makes monthly field trips to local companies, such as Olympic Boat Centers in Seattle. On that trip, the students talked with the company president, who explained how and why his business is successful.

Deca classes are taught in schools across the country and are popular in the Seattle area. The three other high schools in Lake Washington School District have Deca classes.

Eastlake Principal Rondel Hardie said the school just added a new marketing class this year, which isn't under the Deca banner, but does offer "the same skills and opportunities for students to learn these topics."

Deca students are also welcome to form a club on the campus, but the school has room for only so many elective classes, Hardie said.

Eastlake Deca students say they want more. They plan to take their campaign to the Lake Washington School Board meeting Monday, where they want to ask for support during the open-comments session.

"All the other Lake Washington Schools have Deca, and Skyline High School is a powerhouse, with over 250 students," said Matt Villeneuve, 17, co-president of the Eastlake Deca chapter and son of Kim Villeneuve.

The students want class credit for the hours they put in after school working on marketing projects and getting ready for Deca competitions, said Almeera Anwar, 17, who is co-president with Matt Villeneuve.

Hardie said Deca is a "fine program" but that many students are involved in activities for which they never get school credit. And the school's business classes offer many of the same components that Deca has in its program, Hardie said.

Among Eastlake's business-education offerings are entrepreneurship, business and marketing; labs in which students work in the student store; and courses teaching computer skills and programs, Hardie said.

Kim Villeneuve said these courses are not rigorous enough to prepare students for a competitive business climate.

"They aren't listening to what parents are asking for," she said. "We're saying, 'You have a business and marketing program, now just add Deca to it. We'll help you. We'll bring in business and marketing people. We're offering to fundraise.' "

Eastlake Deca already pays a small stipend to Ron Cooper, a marketing teacher and Deca adviser for Bothell High School. Cooper spends every Wednesday at Villeneuve's home, where students learn about marketing strategies and hear presentations.

Last year Eastlake Deca students did a survey of 242 Eastlake High School students which showed that just less than 30 percent of them wanted Deca to be included in their school's class offerings. And more than 50 students wanted to join, but the group could pick only 18 because of space constraints of Villeneuve's living room, Cooper said.

"If this were in the high school, we could have all 50 students," Cooper said. "We could take this program straight into the high school."

District director Ken Lyon, who oversees the Eastlake Learning Community, said that while core curricula like math, science, and social studies are set by the district, electives are decided by each school.

At Eastlake, an advisory committee made up of teachers who oversee each department recommends what new courses to add each year.

"It's done in a democratic way," Lyon said. "In light of the needs they saw, they made changes. But it didn't satisfy parents who wanted more than that."

Rachel Tuinstra: 206-515-5637 or rtuinstra@seattletimes.com