Students of College of Eastern Utah returned triumphantly from the 2008 Skills USA national competition held at Kansas City, Mo. this past week.
Skills USA is the national organization for students in trade, industrial, technical and health occupations education. It sponsors the Skills USA 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.
The national competition is held annually to provide students with national-level competition in 91different areas of technical education. The contestants represent the 300,000 members from all fifty states and four territories, but only two percent are invited to the national competition. Each representative has won a gold medal in their particular area on the state level.
CEU was represented in this year’s competition by six students competing in the areas of welding, cosmetology, and automotive technology.
Mason Winters-Jensen of the CEU Welding Department took the Gold in Post Secondary Welding.
“Since College of Eastern Utah students began competing at Skills USA in 2001, they have continually improved their standings,” said Lon Youngberg, CEU welding instructor. “In 2001 CEU’s representative finished 7th, 6th in 2003, 4th in 2004, 4th in 2005, 2nd in 2006, 2nd in 2007 and finally reached the gold medal stand in 2008.”
A team made up of Josh Critchlow (Price), Riley Harrison , and Nick Richens (Vernal) competed in a newly created category called team welding fabrication.
Their result mirrored Mason’s as they collectively walked away with the gold.
Danielle Christensen of Manti came home with the Silver Medal for Customer Service in Cosmetology.
Quinn Holliday of Blanding also represented CEU in the action skills portion of the Automotive Technology competition.
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