When an opportunity presented itself out of the blue for a national Future Business leaders of America (FBLA) competition, Diamond Bar High School junior Felix Peng took the chance and won third place for himself among thousands of other competitors. 

The event is called the Winter Financial Literacy Competition and took place over winter break; the competition consisted of a gauntlet of business-oriented questions with contestants progressing through accuracy. It is one of many competitions hosted by FBLA in its National Awards Program and advertised on its official Instagram page. 

“Signing up was super simple. There was just a link to the test on their Instagram,” Peng said. “This was one of those rare moments where scrolling through the app didn’t waste my time.”

The competition consisted of a multiple-choice question test, with short-answer segments towards the end to serve as tiebreakers. Although not preparing specifically for this event, Peng had taken the time to expand on his financial knowledge with help from business teacher John Pierce and his online research. 

“This competition was just an opportunity that came out of nowhere. Since the competition was over break, I just took the test during my spare time,” Peng said. 

Prior to taking part in this competition, Peng also placed in FBLA’s top ten in California for their Virtual Business Challenges competition. Business game developer Knowledge Matters sponsored the event and the test took the form of simulated financial issues. 

“These were simulations where I had to play as either a college student managing my finances or a jean-manufacturing business owner,” Peng said. “I spent a lot of time running through these simulations over and over again.” 

Peng said he plans on pursuing the FBLA program throughout the rest of high school and continuing his financial passion into higher education. 

“They have a collegiate level that will allow me to strengthen my business side and grow my social network, so I’m looking forward to it,” Peng said.