Four IHS students place at state CTE competition

Published 9:08 pm Monday, April 29, 2024

Seventeen Ilwaco High School students made the trek to Tacoma last month to take part in the 2024 SkillsUSA State Leadership and Skills Conference, and four students came home with hardware for their excellent performance.

One IHS student, Hailey Hightower, booked her ticket to nationals in Atlanta in June after taking home first place in graphic imaging sublimation. In this event, competitors are tested on their ability to design, print, transfer and understand the dye sublimation process to decorate materials like t-shirts, drinkware, mouse pads and license plates.

Three other students finished in the top-3 of their respective events at the state competition and earned medals, including Caleb Brundage and Liam Taft, who finished second and third in plumbing, respectively.

Ciara Reddy placed third in screen printing technology, which tests students’ ability to prepare screens, register a multi-color design on a manual printing press and print the design using the printing press — along with completing a written technical knowledge test and participating in an oral professional assessment.

IHS students competed in a variety of events, including 3D visualization and animation, electrical construction wiring, firefighting, first aid/CPR, mobile robotics, pin design, and t-shirt design. The students are enrolled in career and technical education (CTE) classes at the high school, with teachers Andrew Goodwin, Stephen Blasko and Leena Couling serving as SkillsUSA advisors.

As the mobile robotics advisor, Goodwin said he was really proud of the team’s performance. “They had some very strong competition from schools out of Seattle and the Tri-Cities. Although they didn’t place, they worked hard and represented our school well.”

Founded in 1965, SkillsUSA is a CTE organization that serves about 400,000 students in middle school, high school and college across the country, as well as professional members enrolled in training programs.