Ninety-two West Business Professionals of America students traveled to Des Moines for the annual Fall Leadership Conference Nov 1. This conference is designed to kick off the new BPA year and let students develop their confidence and leadership skills before competing at state in February.
The 2025-26 state leadership board features two West students: State President Praneel Rastogi ’26 and Head of Marketing Ira Dirar ’26. They, along with the other four members of the board, worked tirelessly to plan, organize and lead this year’s FLC.
“We’ve been starting to plan this since July. So being able to finally just see how it all comes together and to see how everyone else reacts to it was something that I really looked forward to,” Dirar said.
This year’s Fall Leadership Conference featured mini sessions like Polish Your Posture, Debate Dash and Lead From the Front. These mini sessions are designed to teach fundamental business skills to the incoming high schoolers.
“One is debate dash and I run that one. That one is focused on how to present yourself. I guess I would say it really helps with learning how to think on your feet and present things in a persuasive way,” Dirar said.
West student Stanislav Volk ’28 personally named Debate Dash as his favorite mini session. He found he gained valuable knowledge about how to conduct himself professionally and developed a better understanding of BPA through FLC.
“I’ve learned so far that everyone here is very responsible and this conference teaches you a lot about life and how stuff works,” Volk said.
Following the mini sessions, two members, Taleen Rahhal ’27 and Ella Ciliberto ’27, were recognized for their BPA achievements at an impact dinner designed to award hardworking members from each Iowa chapter.
“I feel like I’ve done a lot, and it just felt nice to be recognized for what I’ve done and that people are noticing what I’ve been doing for our chapter,” Rahhal said.
West business teacher and BPA advisor, Diane Fickel, gave the idea for this dinner. She wanted to give members who aren’t on the state leadership board more recognition for their hard work.
“There are so many people from every chapter that make an impact, and so this dinner was added to recognize people from every chapter that are doing an outstanding job,” Fickel said. “Maybe they just aren’t state officers, but they’re doing really great things at the local level.”
After dinner, the state leadership board hosted activities like rock painting and bracelet making, ending with a dance party in the ballroom. Sophomore Kevin Sa appreciated the opportunity to hang out with friends and network with other students from across the state at these events.
“All the sessions so far have been pretty good,” Sa said. “There’s certain things you need in a business environment, like soft skills, people skills, and this conference really emphasized that.”
The conference closed with an entrepreneurship event called 60 ideas in 60 minutes, hosted by Junior Achievement. This event gave students 15 minutes to create a business to solve a real-world problem, and those who won in their problem groups shared their pitch to the entire conference.
The final winners included two West groups.
Juniors Kristy Kikizawa, Reel Matar, Kavya Bhatt and Taleen Rahhal ranked first for their presentation on pollution. Juniors Dylan Colleran, Aydan Thomas, Owen Huges and Aaron Kang placed second for their presentation on loss of cultural identity.
These 92 members left with a greater understanding of BPA and the business world as a whole, and Fickel plans to hit the ground running for the State Leadership Conference in February.
“FLC is really our culture-building event for West, and I think they had a great time,” Fickel said. “The competition season has begun, and so we will be focusing on competitions and preparing students to be successful and continue the West High legacy through competitions at the State Leadership Conference.”
