This year Lake Stevens High School sent off 12 students to attend the Family Career and Community Leaders of America (FCCLA) state conference to compete in star events and act as evaluators. Star events are competitive events in which members are recognized for proficiency and achievement in chapter and individual projects, leadership skills, and career preparation.Evaluators are students and adults who judge and critique the presenters projects giving them a score out of 100. Everyone who attended the FCCLA state conference that took place in Kennewick, Washington March 7th to 11th helped out in many ways to make the event possible allowing many students to win awards that they deserved.

At state, students compete in different categories of star events to see if they will eventually be able to qualify to nationals, so here are the list of qualifiers: Lauren Lindbloom and Carlos Rojo, Samantha Link and Maleah Plank, Taylor Garcia and Meraiah Medellin, Destiny Otusanya, Grace Fortney, Savannah Pratt. Also, senior Jacob Anderson is in the top eight for creating an FCCLA website and qualifies for nationals as well.  In addition we had two great students that went and acted as evaluators at competing star events, senior Aleeya DeFalco and  junior Sydney Springer.

These students are eligible to attend the National FCCLA conference early July in Nashville, Tennessee.

Students attended a number of workshops where they learned how to deal with things such as stress and failure and also try to learn how to become better leaders.

“My favorite activity was the gala that we had after the award ceremony because it was a lot of fun to dance and have fun with all FCCLA members,” junior Grace Fortney said.

The gala that took place after the award ceremony was where members dressed up in their best clothes and got to dance and hang out with their friends. It was a little treat for all the FCCLA members who worked so hard to make such outstanding projects.

Students also took a chance to run as new state officers for future big meetings and two students at our school won positions. The two students are Taylor Garcia as Vice president and Grace Fortney as Secretary.

People join this club for many reasons- it helps build character and also teaches good leadership skills as well.

“I wanted to join FCCLA because of my interest of becoming a better leader,” junior Savannah Pratt said. Ms. Pratt competed in the Early Childhood presentation which involved making a lesson plans for 6-8 year olds and presenting in front of judges. Savannah Pratt ended up taking gold and is the national representative for Early Childhood Education in our state.