Middle Georgia Technical College

MGTC's PBL Chapter Racks Up Awards at State Conference

April 25, 2007

The weekend of April 13-15 brought over 400 delegates from across the state to the Phi Beta Lambda State Conference in Atlanta.  Middle Georgia Technical College’s chapter took twelve students to the conference, and came away with a host of awards for the students and the chapter.

Competitions for individuals or teams at the State Conference can range from events that cover a particular subject, such as Accounting or Economics, to performance events where judges evaluate the preparation and presentation of the students on current business topics.  There are also several chapter wide events, which are the results of weeks of hard work by all the members of the college’s chapter.  The Conference is also a great opportunity for students to network with colleagues from other schools and gain valuable leadership experience.

Several members of the MGTC PBL Chapter won multiple awards at the awards ceremony.  Allan Ramsey, who competed in Financial Concepts, took home first place.  Kenny Mitchell and Judy Barnickel who competed in Community Service Project also took home first place for their work on the campus wide blood drives.  They again teamed up in Business Ethics to take home a second place award. Jessica Hegg and Amber Lethco worked together to take first place in Network Design.  Jeannie Parrish, PBL Secretary, placed Second in Statistical Analysis competition.  Sisters Courtney Hatt and Katie Mealey also finish first in their event Emerging Business Issues and later Third in Business Decision Making. Nancy Lewis’ hard work on the local Chapter Annual Business Report placed third and Barbara Dawes and Theresa Watkins finished Third and Fourth in the Future Business Executive event. Last but not least Mellissa Kelley took home two fifth place finishes in Information Management and Telecommunications.

As a chapter, Xi Alpha Nu at Middle Ga. Tech garnered the Floy McGarity Silver Seal Award of Merit.  In addition, Ms. Michelle Bowen, a valuable friend of MGTC won the Businessperson of the Year award for her contributions to the chapter and President Daniel Sneed was recognized as being Who’s Who in Georgia PBL for 20007.  Each of the competitors finishing in either First or Second will be eligible to move on to the National Conference in June in Chicago.

Phi Beta Lambda is the college level division of the international FBLA-PBL Career and Technical Student organization.  FBLA-PBL is a non-profit organization of middle school, high school, college, and professional members designed to help students transition from their education into the business world.  FBLA-PBL is the largest student-run business related organization in the United States with over 250,000 members.  MGTC’s PBL chapter consistently has top finishers in state and national competitions and allows students to not only compete with their peers, but also to interact with business partners throughout the community to prepare them to take their place in the workforce.

Winners of State PBL Awards pose with President Ivan H. Allen and Faculty Advisor Sam Lester