SkillsUSA students at Carbon Career and Technical Institute competed, along with 11 other schools and successfully placed in the SkillsUSA District 1, Northeast Region District Level competition on Dec. 14 and Jan. 6 at Johnson College and Luzerne County Community College, respectively.

SkillsUSA is a partnership of students, teachers and industry working together to ensure America has a skilled workforce. A nonprofit national education association, SkillsUSA serves middle-school, high-school and college/postsecondary students preparing for careers in trade, technical and skilled service occupations.

SkillsUSA Mission Statement is “SkillsUSA empowers its members to become world-class workers, leaders and responsible American citizens. We improve the quality of our nation’s future skilled workforce through the development of SkillsUSA Framework skills that include personal, workplace and technical skills grounded in academics. Our vision is to produce the most highly skilled workforce in the world, providing every member the opportunity for career success.”

SkillsUSA serves more than 333,527 students and instructors annually. This includes 19,019 instructors who join as professional members. Including alumni, SkillsUSA membership totals over 394,000. SkillsUSA has served nearly 14 million annual members cumulatively since 1965 and is recognized by the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of Labor as a successful model of employer-driven workforce development.

SkillsUSA is a United States career and technical student organization serving more than 395,000 high school, college and middle school students and professional members enrolled in training programs in trade, technical and skilled service occupations, including health occupations.

More than 600 corporations, trade associations and labor unions actively support SkillsUSA on a national level through financial aid, in-kind contributions and involvement of their people in SkillsUSA activities. Many more work directly with state associations and local chapters.

SkillsUSA programs include local, regional, state and national competitions. During the annual national-level SkillsUSA Championships, more than 6,500 students compete in 100 hands-on skill and leadership contests.

SkillsUSA programs also help to establish industry standards for job skill training in the classroom and is cited as a “successful model of employer-driven youth development training program” by the U.S. Department of Labor.

The SkillsUSA State competition will be held at the Hershey Lodge and Convention Center on April 4 to 8.