Champions at Work: Roosevelt Student Takes Top Spot in SkillsUSA Competition

SkillsUSA First place winners are now eligible to compete in the annual national-level SkillsUSA Championships, where more than 4,500 students from throughout the country will vie for honors in 77 occupational and leadership skill areas.

Mercedes Ruiz articulated her job skills to a panel of judges so convincingly that she won First Place honors in the Job Skills Demonstration at the NY State SkillsUSA competition held in Syracuse last week.

Her Roosevelt High School classmates, Freity DelaRosa and Hassan Hitulah, took home third place honors for 3D Computer Animation, and Denisse Osario was also awarded a third place nod for Prepared Speech.  Roosevelt coaches are Frank Leonetti, Noreen Riotto, and Elaine Betancourt. 

Saunders Trades and Technical High School earned academic honors at the competition, with its silver finish in the prestigious Quiz Bowl, which tests the knowledge of team members on various aspects of general academic knowledge, professional development and current events. Team members are Melody Niere, Daniel Cuomo, Darwin Araujo, Leonel Rosario, Michael Cinelli, Jason Lam and Katrina Feri. Their advisor is David Smith.

SkillsUSA is a partnership of students, teachers and industry working together to ensure America has a skilled work force. SkillsUSA serves more than 280,000 high school and college students and professional members in 13,000 school chapters in 54 state and territorial associations. SkillsUSA: Champions at Work is the theme of the organization.