America's Highly Skilled Work Force Meets In Kansas City

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The Minnesota SkillsUSA delegation returned to Kansas City for the SkillsUSA Championships, June 24-28, 2013, as part of the SkillsUSA 49th annual National Leadership and Skills Conference (NLSC), a showcase of career and technical education students. During the week, more than 5,900 outstanding career and technical education students-all state contest winners competed hands-on in 98 different trade, technical and leadership fields.

The winners of the annual SkillsUSA Championships were announced Friday evening, June 28, 2013 at the Awards Ceremony of the National Leadership and Skills Conference. The Conference was held June 24 - June 28, 2013, at the Municipal Auditorium, Kemper Arena, H. Roe Bartle Hall, the downtown Marriott and the downtown Sheraton Hotel in Kansas City, Missouri. Over 5,900 outstanding career and technical education students joined in the excitement of hands-on competition in 98 different trade, technical, and leadership fields. Mike Rowe, creator and executive producer of Discovery Channel's Emmy-nominated series "Dirty Jobs with Mike Rowe" delivered the keynote speech at the event on Wednesday evening, June 26th. Caterpillar Inc. sponsored the Opening Ceremony and Lowe's sponsored the Awards Ceremony.

SkillsUSA is the national organization for students in trade, industrial, technical and health occupations education. It sponsors the SkillsUSA Championships annually to recognize the achievements of career and technical education students and to encourage them to strive for excellence and pride in their chosen occupations.

Working against the clock and each other, the participants proved their expertise in job skills for occupations such as electronics, technical drafting, precision machining, medical assisting and culinary arts. There were also competitions in leadership skills, such as extemporaneous speaking and conducting meetings by parliamentary procedures.

The Minnesota Delegation of over 250 students, advisors, voting delegates and national education team members were on hand for the weeklong event. Special congratulations to the entire Minnesota Delegation for such a great showing in medal count, bringing home 26 medallion winners in both college and high divisions in sixty-two different leadership/skilled contest areas and fifty-nine (59) students also received their Skill Point Certificate at NLSC. The Skills Point Certificate is a tool to recognize outstanding talent beyond those who earn the gold, silver or bonze medals at the SkillsUSA Championships. High scorers in the contests received Skill Point Certificates. The Skill Point Certificate was awarded in 86 occupational and leadership areas to students who achieved a high score defined by industry. The SkillsUSA Championships have been a premier event since 1967.

Students from the following colleges competed at the National conference: Alexandria Technical & Community College, Century College, Dakota County Technical College, Dunwoody College of Technology, Hennepin Technical College- Brooklyn Park and Eden Prairie Campuses, Lake Superior College, M State-Detroit Lakes, M-State-Moorhead, Ridgewater College-Hutchinson, Riverland Community College-Austin, St. Cloud Technical & Community College, Saint Paul College, and South Central College-North Mankato.

Students from the following high schools/technical centers competed at the national conference: Alexandria Technical & Community College, Anoka High School, Austin High School, Cambridge-Isanti High School, Carver-Scott Educational Cooperative, Central Lakes College-Staples, Century High School, Dakota County Area Learning School, Duluth Denfeld High School, Duluth East High School, Foley High School, John F. Kennedy High School, Mounds View High School, Northeast Metro 916, Red Wing High School, Roseville High School, Stillwater High School, Tartan High School, Technical High School and Wayzata High School.

Special congratulations to Mounds View High School who received the Grand Prize Award as the best Student2Student Mentor Recognition Program. Accepting the award on Wednesday evening, June 26th were Mrs. Lynn Nelson, advisor and student member, Andrew Wrobel. Special Congratulations also to Phoua Kong, Saint Paul College on receiving the President's Volunteer Service Award in the Silver Division. Also in attendance during the conference from Minnesota were Paul Anderson, Human Resources Technical Recruiter, Ziegler CAT, Colonel John Hinck, United States Army, Joyce Swenson, Director of Program Administration, Synergy & Leadership Exchange and Deborah Yungner, Chairman, Founder, & Chief Visionary Officer ERBUS LifeGRID Technologies.

SkillsUSA is a national partnership of students, teachers and industry, working together to ensure America has a skilled workforce. SkillsUSA chapters help students who are preparing for careers in technical, skilled and service occupations excel. SkillsUSA has more than 300,000 students and instructors as members. SkillsUSA organizes this event, and it is considered the single greatest day of industry volunteerism in America every year at an estimated cost of more than $36 million. Each SkillsUSA Championships contestant is a state-level gold medalist.

Top student winners received gold, silver and bronze medallions. Many also received prizes such as tools of their trade and/or scholarships to further their careers and education. The SkillsUSA Championships is for high school and college-level students who are members of SkillsUSA.

The SkillsUSA Championships is unique because more than 1,700 technical experts from labor and industry design and judge the contests to a set of entry-level job skills that test both a student's knowledge and hands-on abilities. Safety practices and procedures - an area of great concern to labor and management alike - are judged and graded and constitute a portion of a contestant's score. Students who excel in competition know they have achieved the skills necessary to be successful when they enter the workforce. SkillsUSA affiliated instructional programs represent one hundred thirty different occupational areas.

The philosophy of the SkillsUSA Championships is to reward students for excellence, to involve industry in directly evaluating student performance and to keep training relevant to employer's needs.

For additional information, please contact: Jennifer Polz, Executive Director, SkillsUSA Minnesota
P.O. Box 29286 • Minneapolis, MN 55429 • 763.560.1932 Office • 763.560.1936 Fax
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Website: www.mnskillsusa.org

SkillsUSA is a partnership of students, teachers and industry representatives, working together to ensure America has a skilled workforce. SkillsUSA helps each student to excel.

SkillsUSA is a national organization serving teachers and high school and college students who are preparing for careers in technical, skilled and service occupations, including health occupations. SkillsUSA was formerly known as VICA (the Vocational Industrial Clubs of America).

SkillsUSA programs also help to establish industry standards for job skill training in the lab and classroom, and promote community service. SkillsUSA is recognized by the U.S. Department of Education and is cited as a successful model of employer-driven youth development training program” by the U.S. Department of Labor.