Photos used with permission.
Despite the challenges of an ongoing pandemic, members across the country were determined to find safe ways to celebrate SkillsUSA Week in 2021 while showcasing the importance of SkillsUSA’s mission. Chapters engaged in experiences that honored their community supporters, connected with local business and industry professionals and shared SkillsUSA with their administrators. Here are just a few examples of our chapters and national officers in action during the week:
- For Recognition Day on Monday, Feb. 8, SkillsUSA students from Wildwood Campus in Hornell, N.Y., provided SkillsUSA thermal lunch bags filled with lunch and cupcakes prepared by their culinary department for their CTE faculty and staff.
- For Give Back Day on Tuesday, Feb. 9, the students from the Franklin County Career and Technical Center SkillsUSA chapter in Meadville, Miss., finished building and delivering a bed to a child in their community who didn’t have one.
- For Partner Day on Wednesday, Feb. 10, students from Cheyenne (Wyo.) Central High School hosted representatives from 4Rivers, the local John Deere dealer. The SkillsUSA members provided a tour of their engineering and welding labs, and industry representatives spoke about the opportunities within 4Rivers and John Deere.
- For Advocacy Day on Thursday, Feb. 11, the national officers held a virtual meeting with Rep. Glenn Thompson (R-Pa.), the co-chair of the House Career and Technical Education Caucus. “CTE is in a solid place because it has so much support,” Thompson told the officers.
- For Celebration Day on Friday, Feb. 12, students from the Southeastern Regional Vocational Technical High School in South Easton, Mass., celebrated SkillsUSA by hosting a virtual SkillsUSA-themed scavenger hunt.
SkillsUSA national high school vice president Kayla Ketterling participated in Cheyenne Central High’s visit with 4Rivers John Deere representatives on Partner Day. “It was a great exchange of information, and everyone had a lot of fun,” Ketterling says. “It was really cool to hear how many of them entered the company as technicians and worked their way up. They said the skills gap is a very real problem that they deal with every day. Many of them had not heard of SkillsUSA before, so it was really neat to be their first exposure to SkillsUSA. They loved hearing about our mission as an organization and how our chapter is working to reach that mission.”
SkillsUSA salutes all our chapters who, in the face of tough challenges, made SkillsUSA Week 2021 a rousing, difference-making success.
