Southern’s Teams Sweep State Competition and Win National SkillsUSA Title
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Forgoing vacation time during spring break in March, six students and a professor from the School of Computing at Southern Adventist University competed in the annual SkillsUSA State Competition, where Southern earned first, second, and third place honors in the web design and development category. The university has taken top honors each time it has competed since 2022.
Following their state victory, first-place team members Logan Gardner, junior computer science major, and Shinny No, senior computer science major, advanced to the national competition in Atlanta during the first week of June, where they earned first place in the same category.
SkillsUSA is a national organization that promotes workforce development for students, empowering them to become skilled professionals, career-ready leaders and responsible community members. Tasked with fixing broken websites, participants at the competition spent six hours debugging, redesigning, and editing sites for mock clients.
“It was gratifying to take home first place after all the hours we put into prepping
for the competition,” No says. “I feel like the win demonstrated our collaboration
skills and knowledge in web development.”
No says she was confident Southern could sweep the podium at the state level and hopes
to continue the winning streak next year.
Second place went to junior computer science majors Gia James and Eri Jorge.
“I’m thankful we performed so well,” Jorge notes. “Our main competition was Logan and Shinny, who deserved this year’s win. Plus, knowing Southern has won first, second, and third place several times before helped me not be too worried. Winning second place at my first competition? I’m cool with that.”
Vilina Prenko and Parker Russo, sophomore and junior computer science majors, earned third place, while Assistant Professor Dakota Cookenmaster, ’22 and ’24 alum, advised all three of Southern’s teams.
The national title marks the third time Southern has won first place in the category at the national level, following gold-medal finishes in 2022 and 2023.
“I was incredibly excited and proud of my students,” Cookenmaster shares. “It's been thrilling to see our school excel multiple years in a row.”
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