Severna Park Team Strikes Gold At SkillsUSA National Championships

Three students are viewing their high school experience through a new lens after winning a national competition with their photography business.

Severna Park High School (SPHS) students Jackson DuPee, Tiiu Nomm and Holly Braughton won their competition category at the SkillsUSA National Leadership and Skills Conference in Atlanta in early June. That result marked the first gold won by a team from SPHS in program history.

Through SkillsUSA, student teams use their course of study as the basis of a project that will benefit their class, school, community or industry. The annual championships include 115 competitions.

“There are endless competitions,” Braughton said. “Anyone could find an interest. There’s everything from welding to culinary to engineering — every skill and trade that you can think of.”

The trio of Severna Park students competed in the Career Pathways: Business, Management, and Technology category. A fourth student, Rome Jones, served as a key member of the team throughout the year but missed the event at nationals.

Severna Park also had two top-10 finishes from the American Spirit and Community Action teams.

“To have three of our four teams achieve those results on the national stage is something we’re incredibly proud of,” said Roxanne Angerer, SkillsUSA co-advisor at Severna Park High School. “The students represented SPHS exceptionally well all week, and their hard work truly paid off.”

After winning bronze in the Entrepreneurship competition last year, DuPee and Nomm teamed up this time with a goal to do even better. A new recruit became their third member.

“Throughout the year, I really wanted to win the gold, being a senior,” said DuPee, who took the lead on the project. “Rome was into photography and we thought, ‘Why don’t we come together and combine our talents?’”

Last year for the SkillsUSA national Entrepreneurship competition, the group created a fake business called EcoEssence, which offered a can to clean recyclables and educated consumers about materials that are recyclable.

For the project this year, they made a real business: Bright Bee Photography. They scheduled photo shoots at their school and took pictures for a daycare and the SPCA of Anne Arundel County. By partnering with the Annapolis-based Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, they received an immediate emotional payoff as three of the 15 dogs photographed were adopted following the campaign.

“We really just sat down and brainstormed a hole in the market that we could fill,” Nomm said. “The SPCA was a good fit, and it was so hard not to adopt the dogs on the spot.”

At school, they organized a Christmas event with a student dressed as the Grinch, followed by a meet-and-greet with the Easter Bunny in the spring. They also took student headshots.

“We really wanted to focus on creating events people would come to,” DuPee said. “A lot of photographers go to weddings or birthday parties. We wanted people to come to us.”

SkillsUSA also encourages participants to connect with industry professionals. Jones contacted Chris Fincham from Fincham Photography for help. The group also had to keep a project journal, log events, and write a business plan.

The group needed three members, and Jones could not make it to nationals in June, so they recruited a familiar face as Braughton came onboard. Less than 12 hours after DuPee and Nomm graduated, the group flew to Atlanta.

Before making their presentation to three judges, the trio had a moment to view competing projects.

“When we looked at the other projects, there was a wooden bench with solar panels to charge a phone to put in the park,” DuPee said. “There was an app to track your service hours. … These were advanced projects that students presented.”

When the time arrived for the SPHS team to explain their project, each member gave part of the presentation.

“We gave Tiiu the role of lead photographer, I was in charge of finance, and Holly was in charge of marketing,” DuPee said.

Group members believe they gave an informational and moving overview of their work and the partnerships they made. They finished ahead of a second-place team from Erie, Pennsylvania, and the third-place entry from Lexington, Massachusetts.

“We found out one of the judges teared up at the end of the presentation,” DuPee said. “We never found out why … but getting called for gold was exciting.”

Nomm said, “It’s definitely super rewarding to see the outcome. I was confident in our project after all that work we put in this year and after coming in third last year.”

DuPee said the competition honed his workplace, technical and personal skills. He credited his teammates and SPHS SkillsUSA co-advisors Roxanne Angerer and Michelle Dugans.

“Developing my technical skills and learning to work with different kinds of people has shaped me and will help me in the workforce,” he said. “It’s really important to try it if you’re in high school. The teachers spend a lot of time, and they don’t get the recognition they deserve. They don’t get to go onstage or get any fancy medals.”

All three winners plan to study business or a related field in college, though Braughton has another year at SPHS. Armed with a new set of abilities and a new perspective, they would recommend the SkillsUSA program to students who are willing to work hard.

“It’s really exciting to compete,” Braughton said. “It also shows that success comes from consistent effort. To win a gold medal, it takes a lot of time.

“I will take away persistence,” she added. “When your schedule is busy and you have a lot of homework, practice your scripts and work on your business plan. The more effort and practice, you can only go up.”