SkillsUSA Students From Parkside High CTE Earn Top Honors At National SkillsUSA Competition

Six students trained and educated in the Parkside High School Department of Career & Technology Education recently won top national honors at SkillsUSA’s 45th annual National Leadership and Skills Conference and Competition, a showcase for career and technology education students.

“We are very proud of our students and our graduates for their outstanding performance at the national SkillsUSA competition,” said Dr. John Fredericksen, superintendent of schools. “This is a testament to the dedication and skill of these students, and to the outstanding programs and instructors at the Parkside High School Department of Career & Technology Education.”

This was the first year in which Wicomico sent a welding team to compete at nationals, and the three-man welding team of Dan Chance, John Winn and Matt Fletcher did an outstanding job, winning the silver medal in Welding Fabrication. The team members worked together against the clock to follow a blueprint to fabricate a stand-up toolbox. Chance and Winn are 2009 graduates of Parkside High, and Fletcher is a 2009 graduate of Mardela High.

For the third straight year, a Parkside CTE Electronics program student brought home the national SkillsUSA gold medal. (Alex Stevenson, 2008 Parkside graduate, won the gold medal in 2007 and 2008.) This year, the gold-medal winner in Electronics Technology was 2008 Parkside graduate Spencer Crockett, a student at Wor-Wic Community College who competed at the post-secondary level with Parkside’s SkillsUSA chapter. It was a strong win: Crockett was 53 points (out of 1,000 points) ahead of the second-place finisher, and more than 200 points ahead of any other finisher.

Parkside High’s Tyler Moskov also performed well in the Electronics Technology contest, placing fifth in a field of 36 state champions and coming home the highest-scoring junior in the Electronics Technology contest. As a senior this year, he will have the opportunity to compete in SkillsUSA again.

The outstanding showing by Wicomico students continued in the Electronics Applications competition, where 2009 Parkside High graduate Jung An finished second in the nation, earning a silver medal. He finished just 5 points (out of 1,000) behind the gold-medal winner. He will attend Salisbury University this fall, and plans to transfer to the University of Maryland College Park after one year for the engineering program.

This year’s SkillsUSA national conference, held June 21-26 in Kansas City, also brought special recognition for Jim Maynard, the Parkside SkillsUSA advisor. He was called on stage for recognition as one of the top 4 SkillsUSA advisors in the nation.

“Jim is not the type of guy to toot his own horn, but I sincerely give Mr. Maynard credit for keeping myself and all the students informed as to the requirements of each competition,” said Dave Miles, electronics instructor at Parkside CTE. “He constantly went above and beyond as he reminded us of what to bring, where to be, what to do and what not to do. He also drove his own vehicle with equipment for the competition to Kansas City, saving the county money in shipping costs and airfare. He is a true professional who fully deserved this recognition.”

The annual SkillsUSA competition and conference hosted more than 5,000 competitors from the United States, Guam and Puerto Rico. The results prove that Wicomico students and the career and technology programs at Parkside are some of the best in the country – good news for the community, which benefits from the skills of many CTE students, said Bryan Ashby, supervisor of career and technology education.

Nationally, SkillsUSA serves more than 300,000 CTE students and professional members enrolled in trade, technical, and skilled-service occupations, including the allied health professions.