FCCLA had its first conference on Thursday, October 9th. This conference was the Region Six Leadership Conference. The schools that attended the Region 6 conference were: Wenatchee High School, Eastmont School District, Cashmere High School, Quincy School District, Pateros High School, Omak High School, and Chelan High School. Each student who attended got a name tag with a color. These colors divided students into four groups. red, green, blue, and purple. Each group attended four stations in a different order.
Group one focused on star events, which are competitions that students can participate in. Star in star events stands for Students Taking Action with Recognition. Star events can take students to regional, state, and national levels. State will be held in Spokane, Washington, this year, and Nationals will be held in Washington, D.C.
Group two was evaluator training. Evaluators are students who judge other students’ star projects during regionals and state. This taught us how to fairly judge others’ projects based on the rubric.
Group three was FCCLA 101. This covered what FCCLA is about, and what opportunities FCCLA opens such as scholarships and financial help for college. Students during this group got to collaborate with a group of five to make a funny story.
Group four was leadership in FCCLA. This covered how to get into club, region or state leadership and what leadership roles are available in FCCLA. We also played “would you rather” in this group which allowed us to connect with other FCCLA members from other schools.
One major event that happens at this conference is the basket raffle. Each school submits one basket full of goodies, such as candy, blankets, and essentials related to a certain theme. This year’s theme was Halloween/fall, and each school had to submit a basket within that theme. Many baskets included a fall blanket, some snacks, a fall candle, and other items that students were eager to win.
At the door, students who attended got two tickets that they could put in the raffle. Students had a chance to win more tickets at the breakout groups that everyone was split into after the opening ceremony. By answering questions and sharing their thoughts, students received as many tickets as many times as they chose to share in front of the group. This taught public speaking to the students, and by the end of the day, faces were known and students were comfortable around each other as well as speaking in front of the groups.
The raffle was called at the end of the day. Students rushed to put their tickets in the drawings, hoping to win one of the six baskets displayed. One by one, baskets were called off. Sophomores Emily Swanson, Kaili Landes, Sophia Marrón, and Hannah Cox answered questions all day and racked up 51 tickets total. Together, they decided to put their tickets in the same raffle basket and split the winnings if any of them happened to win.
The girls ended up winning the items displayed in the photo, splitting up the winnings.
Overall, the girls said that the raffle was probably one of the best parts of the conference. Marrón said, “I’m so glad we won the raffle; we are definitely going to use this strategy again next year.”
The conference was a great experience for all the students who attended, and Cashmere FCCLA hopes to take more students next year.
