DECA was founded as “Distributive Education Clubs of America.” Distributive Education was the traditional name for marketing and entrepreneurship education when DECA was first founded. In the modern era “distributive education” is no longer used and we’ve grown to be an international organization with thousands of members beyond the U.S. with a common mission statement: DECA prepares emerging leaders and entrepreneurs in marketing, finance, hospitality and management.

We have eight guiding principles that will give you more insight into our commitments to the students, schools, and communities we aim to serve. Each of our eight principles is represented in our organization's emblem—the DECA Diamond. The inner four points of the DECA Diamond represent the purpose of our compressive educational programs. Simply put, these four points help to answer the question, “What does DECA do?”

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The outer four points of the DECA Diamond are also symbolic to the efforts of Illinois DECA. These four points help to answer the question, “What does DECA aim to achieve?” For our students, and all of our stakeholders, DECA strives to ensure they are:

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Using these eight principles, DECA continues to excel as a co-curricular organization that connects the learning students are doing in the classroom with real world experience and industry connections. We believe this differentiates us from many clubs and extracurricular activities that students participate in because our organization is designed to be an integral part of the classroom instruction.

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Illinois DECA, a Chartered Association of DECA Inc. since 1947, has 70 plus chapters and over 5,100 members.  DECA, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit student organization with more than 250,000 members in all 50 United States, the District of Columbia, Canada, China, Germany, Guam, Mexico, Puerto Rico and Spain. The United States Congress, the United States Department of Education and state, district and international departments of education authorize DECA’s programs.