Coming Up at EHS: Competitions

By Lorena Coleman

SkillsUSA:

SkillsUSA students will be participating in competitions for the their associated class second semester. “There are a variety of competitions available through SkillsUSA depending on which class you are in,” said drafting teacher Jace Stewart. These classes include Drafting (Technical and Architectural), Cabinetmaking, Collision Repair, Culinary Arts, Health Sciences (Health Knowledge, Medical Math and Medical Terminology) and Graphic Design.

In addition to those competitions, there are others that aren’t program specific. These include Technical Math, Quiz Bowl, Prepared Speech, Job Interview and Job Skill Demonstration.

Senior Justin Underwood is participating in the ARCH drawing competitions at JCCC and State competitions. “SkillsUSA is good leadership opportunity, teaches good workplace skills, and is fun to be in.” He stated.

Senior Tanner Mendel is competing in Automotive Refinishing Technology, and hopes to also compete in welding this year. He encourages anyone who is not in an activity already to join SkillsUSA. “I know they will enjoy it as much as I do.” He added.

The majority of the competitions for SkillsUSA will be held at the state competition at the Wichita Area Technical Center on April 23-25.

FBLA:

The Future Business Leaders of America have had many fundraising and community service opportunities to keep them busy this year. They’ve worked concession stands, babysat for monthly PTO meetings, helped with Mud Volleyball and the PTO Jog-a-thon, and recently helped the recreation center with the event “The Great Pumpkin Hunt”.

Senior Kourtney Hadle, who is vice president of community service, says the best thing about being in FBLA is “getting to help out the community as much we can.” She also likes getting to work with other clubs in school for different activities in the community.

On November 7th, five FBLA officers went to Dallas, Texas for three days to participate in the National Fall Leadership Conference. At the conference, the officers attended various workshops designed to help them become better leaders, as well as teach them testing and fundraising skills.

Senior Sadie May stated that her favorite workshop at the conference was called “Debunking the top 10 college myths.” “I enjoyed this workshop the most, and I learned a lot from it.” She added. May has been an officer in FBLA for 3 years, and has “loved every minute of it”.

Eudora will be hosting FBLA’s district competition in February. The state competition will follow in March.

Video Club:

The EHS Video Club recently hosted a 12 hour film fest, from 5 am to 5 pm, on October 19th. The competition called for creating a video in 12 hours using a prompt that teams of video students received that day, while also including specific camera shots and audio effects. They also had to follow the theme of “October Stories”, with the line “don’t look back” included somewhere in the video.

“I loved seeing the collaborative effort of our video students and seeing them follow through with a video was great to see.” Stated video teacher Nate Robinson.

While they did not place at the competition, students of the club felt it was a great experience and are eager to go to the next competition.

When asked what she likes best about video club, Jr. Ellie Beers said she liked getting to create something that everyone would enjoy. “I just love getting to see people’s reactions when they watch one of my products. Getting to tell a story through different shots and different facial expressions is truly amazing.”

Their next competition will be at JCCC in early January. The students have already received their prompt, and will get to shoot most of their video before they arrive at the competition. The video students took first place at this event two years ago, and hope to have an outstanding outcome again this year.

Battle of the Brains:

The EHS Extended Learning students collaborated with the video club to create a project for Battle of the Brains. This competition, affiliated with Science City at Union Station, called for students to create a proposal and construct an interactive exhibit pertaining to the areas of health/biochemical, sustainability, or transportation. The group also had to submit a two-minute video highlighting their proposal. The winning team would get the the opportunity to work with Science City engineers and designers to bring their exhibit to life.

The EHS students made an exhibit surrounding the eye. “‘Eye Spy’ walks the Science City visitor through various educational panels highlighting how the eye works,” Said EL teacher Barbara Hartwell. These include various eye diseases and ailments, how animal and human eyes differ, how babies eyes develop, and why we blink and have eye lashes.

Unfortunately, Eudora did not make the top 10, but Mrs. Hartwell says they will be trying the competition again next year.

When asked what his favorite part of the competition was, Sophomore Griffin Katzenmeier said the end. “The whole thing was mentally exhausting, but also gave me a sense of accomplishment.” He added.

Junior Brenna Sparkes said her favorite part of the competition was being able to work with people she doesn’t get to talk to on a daily basis. “It was an awesome experience to throw around all of our ideas and see what we could come up with.” She said.