Twelve Students Earn Medals at State SkillsUSA Competition
The St. Johnsbury Academy Career and Technical Education program was well represented at this year’s SkillsUSA state competition. The team won five gold medals, four silver medals, and three bronze medals. Gold medal winners will compete in the national SkillsUSA competition in Louisville, Kentucky this summer. Front row, left to right: Alexis Collins ’19, Shawn Guckin ’19, Lucas Ely ’18; second row, left to right: Alec Gauthier ’19, Alex Laflamme ’19, Jake Choiniere ’18; third row, left to right: Max Frechette ’20, Tyler Keithan ’19, Noah Garey ’18, Orin Masure ’18; back row, left to right: Dawson Smires ’18, and Emma Smith ’19.
Twelve St. Johnsbury Academy students won five Gold medals, four Silver Medals, and three Bronze Medals at the Vermont SkillsUSA Leadership and Skills Competition. The five students who won gold medals will go on to compete at the annual national-level SkillsUSA Competition and Conference this June 25-29 in Louisville, Kentucky.
Gold Medals were won by Orin Masure ’18 in Culinary Arts, Max Frechette ’20 in Commercial Baking, Alexis Collins ’19 in Prepared Speech, and Jake Choiniere ’18 and Shawn Guckin ’19 in Teamworks. Silver Medals were won by Emma Smith ’19 in Commercial Baking, Lucas Ely ’18 in Cabinetmaking, and Alex Laflamme ’19 and Tyler Keithan ’19 in Teamworks. Bronze medals were won by Noah Garey ’18 in Cabinetmaking, Dawson Smires ’18 in Welding, and Alex Gauthier ’19 in Auto Repair.
SkillsUSA is a national nonprofit organization serving teachers, high school, and college students who are preparing for careers in trade, technical and skilled service occupations, including health occupations. The organization also helps to establish industry standards for job skill training in the lab and classroom, and promote community service. The Vermont championships attract over 1,000 students from high schools throughout the state with more than 50 hands-on skills and leadership contests, according to the program’s website.
Director of the Academy’s CTE program, Pat Guckin, said, “The accomplishments of our Career and Technical Education students reflect their determination to excel in highly skilled professions. SkillsUSA empowers students to be their best and our students perform at the highest level each year. I am most proud of the professional and personal relationships between our students and their teachers.”
Academy Headmaster Tom Lovett said, “Every year our CTE students and faculty prove they are top in the state and then go on to do well at nationals as well. This degree of excellence takes significant talent, of course, but what sets these students and teachers apart is their unrelenting pursuit of being the best in their fields. They put in hours upon hours of extra work, and these awards are just the most visible of the results.”
