Story by Raymond Yeo
Staff Writer
Photo courtesy of South Pasadena SkillsUSA
State gold medalists of South Pasadena’s SkillsUSA team traveled to Louisville, KY from June 25 to 29 to attend the 54th annual National Leadership and Skills Conference (NLSC). The team showcased their work in various areas of career and technical education and earned high marks for their projects.
Senior Damian Ugalde, freshman Mollie Parker, and juniors Liz Osoy and Brandon Lee traveled to Louisville three days early to attend “activate workshops” in order to become national voting delegates. As delegates, the four Tigers elected new leaders for next year’s conference while also voting on amendments concerning issues like the dress code for transgender competitors and permitting competitors to attend multiple competitions.
While over 6,000 students competed at the event, SPHS students excelled. Skill point certificates, awarded to the top ten contestants in each program, were earned by eight SPHS competitors.
Award Winners:
3rd Place in Community Service – Liz Osoy, Peter Suh, Sebastian Chinen
5th in Occupational Health and Safety – Dhruv Vansadia, Natalie Terhune, Valeriya Smaliy
6th in Interactive Game Design and Video Game Development – Damian Ugalde, Max Wilder-Smith
11th Place in Action Skills – Henry Balding
