FCCLA students bring home honors from state

MEEKER — The annual FCCLA (Family, Career and Community Leaders of America) State Conference was held recently at the Marriot in the Denver Tech Center.
Thirty Meeker High School students and supervisors traveled to Denver April 3 to participate in three days of competition and workshops, along with 1,200 other FCCLA members from around the state.
Twenty-four students competed in STAR (Students Taking Action with Recognition) events from Meeker. STAR events are broken down into many different categories for which individuals or teams create a project. The projects are presented to a group of judges who rank the projects in the gold, silver or bronze level based on the total number of points received. The group that receives the highest number of points in the gold level can then go on to compete at nationals, which will be held in Orlando, Fla., this year.
Meeker had six groups receive the gold ranking and three of those groups finished in second place. The second place finishers are as follows: Sydney Cook and Meg Nieslanik (who competed together in Illustrated Talk), Shae Barrow, Sage Chapin and Elissa McLaughlin (Illustrated Talk/ Jr. Division) and Gabie Goettel, Morgan Nielson and Timbre Shriver (Chapter Showcase).
The three other groups who received gold medals are: Jared Doll, Sam Love and Jake Nieslanik (Chapter Service Display), Megan Ridings (Illustrated Talk) and Marki Cook and Janae Kindall (Interpersonal Communicat-ions).
Two groups finished with silver medals: Hannah Fitzgibbons and Kelsey Rundberg (Interior Design) and Jami Woodward (Focus on Children).
One group received bronze: the Parliamentary Procedure team consisting of Caleb Ball, Seth Boesch, Kelcy Brown, Terrence Casias, Anthony Mazzola, Anthony Merritt and Trenton Schindler.
When the students were not competing they attended leadership workshops and listened to an extraordinary keynote speaker. They also dined at a banquet and attended a dance. The trip was a great success and a learning experience. FCCLA thanks the community for all its support this year and for all its help in raising funds for the trip.