Carlton Townes Makes McKenzie DECA History

On a drive home from Chattanooga, on the way back from the 2025 DECA State Career Development Conference, Carlton Townes spoke with McKenzie High School’s DECA sponsors Susan Dyer and Brittany Colotta. He had just become the state chapter’s newest vice president of marketing.

“Mama Sue,” he asked Dyer. “Am I the first African American from McKenzie to hold a state position?”

As it turned out, he was. Not only was he the first African American student, but he was only the third student from McKenzie High School to ever win an elected position at the state conference. Only Jill Renfro and Brandon Hill preceded him.

DECA, short for Distributive Education Clubs of America, is a club meant to teach different facets of business — marketing, finance, hospitality and management — to high school students. But in the past year, Townes has learned more from the club. He’s realized his inner strength and ability to persevere.

Townes’ idea to run for state officer originated as a joke just a few months before the February conference. It didn’t take much convincing from the club’s sponsors to make him see it as a real option. He talked about it with his great-grandmother, Marsha Townes, and they prayed about his decision together.

From there, Townes’ journey to becoming a DECA state officer was steered by his faith and love for community. When he officially decided to run, Townes realized the important work he could do for the DECA community and his hometown.

At the annual state DECA conference, small schools are typically under-represented. When competing amongst schools like Brentwood High School, which have hundreds of students involved in their chapters and more business-oriented classes, McKenzie students are typically at a disadvantage. Townes wanted to become a representative of small-town schools in the state chapter.

“I told my campaign team when we got together and began planning that the goal of this is to make DECA more diverse,” said Townes, “to feel like everybody’s home away from home, where they can have that safe space to be who they are while learning and loving everything they do, but to also be that voice for small towns and small chapters like mine.”

At the conference, his campaign — “Get Down With Townes” — was a hit. He saw students from all over the state wearing temporary tattoos from his campaign booth. He talked to every student he came across. He wanted to speak to and represent everyone, from all walks of life. He believes that is what set him apart from his competitors.

At the conference, all those running for state office gave a speech in front of all students attending the conference, who then voted for their favorite officer. There were five open positions for the top five contestants to be placed into: president, vice president of marketing, vice president of leadership, vice president of hospitality and vice president of career development.

After giving his speech, Townes went back to his hotel and started crying. He was so nervous.

“You know you truly want something when you start bawling,” he said. “You fought so hard to be here and now you’re nervous because you don’t know [how it will go].”

He found out he won the vice president of marketing role over email. Reading the message, he cried even more. Of the five elected officers, he was the only one from a small town. The other four were from schools in Brentwood, Franklin, Memphis and Spring Hill.

“This is not for me,” he said. “This is for everybody in McKenzie. This is for kids who grew up like I did, who grew up thinking they could never be anything special because of their background.”

Townes has taken his new role with the utmost seriousness. He creates Canva designs for social media and posts weekly “Motivational Monday” videos in which he presents different topics to inspire people to make a difference in others’ lives.

“It’s more than just DECA,” said Townes. “It’s more than that. I post on my DECA pages and my personal Facebook. When I sit down on Saturday or Sunday night and write these, I think, ‘What is something I can talk about that will be able to touch the lives of other people?’”

Every day he is inspired by his late brother, Lorenzo. He pours into others, treating them with love and respect, not only in the context of DECA but in his everyday life.

Townes is the senior class president this year. Aside from DECA, he is a member of McKenzie High School’s Minority Council; Future Teachers of America; Family, Career and Community Leaders of America; Fellowship of Christian Athletes; Health Occupations Students of America, McKenzie Maniacs and Rotary Interact.

He hopes his accomplishments inspire the next generation of students.

“I never thought, in my whole entire life, I would be the first African American to do something here at McKenzie,” said Townes. “It’s not just an accomplishment. It’s a breakthrough.”