Two Waseca seniors headed to national business competition

Waseca High School seniors Sophie Chawra and Lexi Kanewischer both earned a trip to compete at the Business Professionals of America (BPA) national leadership convention set for May 7 to 11 in Orlando, Florida after placing well enough in state competition in early March.

The two advanced to the state level after ranking first in their respective categories during regional competition at Rochester Community and Technical College (RCTC) in January.

Chawra has been a member of the Waseca High School BPA team since her freshman year. She ranked sixth at state competition in “Intermediate Word Processing,” a category which gives participants one hour to proofread and modify unformatted text provided for three different types of documents–for example, a business letter, a memorandum, or a report.  Typically, those ranked in the top five places advance, but a higher-ranked individual declined attending the national contest, opening the way for Chawra to do so.

Chawra had also competed in a “Human Resources” category in March, ranking nineteenth.

Kanewischer placed second in her category, “Interview Skills.” For that competition, participants were informed in advance regarding a professional position, then asked to prepare a letter of application and a resume which were submitted about two weeks prior to the contest. On the day of, competitors played the role of an applicant, spending about 20 minutes telling interviewers about their qualifications and skills.

Kanewischer says that, since the position for which she was pretending to apply was on the entry level, she was able to use real information about herself and her experiences. Kanewischer has been helping her father, Trevor, who operates Waseca’s “Sno-Biz” with social media and other promotions since age 13. Her work was appealing enough that she expanded her clientele and now has a list of regular customers.

Chawra and Kanewischer say they are looking forward to their trip to nationals. While they intend to apply themselves seriously to competition, they also know there is time built into the schedule to visit sites of interest in the Orlando area. Their chaperone for the trip will be Lexi’s mother, Amanda Tesch.

Both young ladies are confident their experiences in BPA will be helpful to them in their futures. Both expect to attend the University of Minnesota Twin Cities campus next fall. Chawra will be earning an undergraduate degree in human physiology with the intent of entering a school of dentistry afterward.

She plans to follow in her mother’s footsteps: Rebecca Thompson is a dentist at Waseca Dental Care and Chawra has had part-time positions with the business. The professional skills she has built while in BPA, she suggests, will be useful when she is someday part of a similar private dentistry practice.

Kanewischer plans to pursue a business degree in marketing. With that major, she says it's clear her experiences with BPA will be helpful.