By Harlan Rose

[email protected]

After sweeping the state Family Career Consumer Leaders of America (FCCLA) competition in February, alumnae Laura Ambrosecchio and Megan Togami competed in the national FCCLA competition held in San Antonio, Texas from July 6 to 10. After devoting much of their time to teaching elementary students the six Career and Technical Education (CTE) pathways, both Ambrosecchio and Togami took home the gold with their project, “When I Grow Up.”

“The goal for our project was to spread awareness about the CTE pathways so they would be able to familiarize themselves about the multiple options and find a pathway that they are interested (in),” Togami said, “With this, the students will be able to choose their classes wisely.”

During their senior year, both Ambrosecchio and Togami created lessons and taught fourth graders at various Mililani elementary schools the importance of the CTE pathways. “(Togami) and I first brainstormed activities for the pathways. We tried to come up with lessons that would be both fun and educational for the fourth grade students,” Ambrosecchio explained. In addition, they researched how a lack of prior knowledge regarding the CTE pathways affected students in secondary education and how it correlated to high school dropout rates.

After presenting their results at the state competition, Ambrosecchio and Togami used the advice they received to make changes to their project in preparation for the national competition. “At the state competition the judges thought that our problem and concern needed to be more detailed and clearly stated,” Ambrosecchio said. Togami added, “We took that advice to heart. We did more research and collected more data to improve the presentation of our project.”

Ambrosecchio and Togami also received advice from FCCLA adviser Jamie Ludwig on how to make their presentation easier for the judges to understand. “I was able to look at (their presentation) and say, ‘Okay, you maybe need to focus more on this area, or make sure you elaborate more on this area,’ because when the judges are doing it, they don’t have any background information,” Ludwig explained, “They’re just looking at what they presented them.”

Even though competing at the national level usually brings more stress, Ambrosecchio and Togami felt more confident than they did at the state level. “Competing at the state level was nerve-wracking because it was my first time competing in (the FCCLA) competition,” Togami said. Ambrosecchio added, “Nationals was nerve-wracking as well, but I think that we were more confident in what we were presenting about so that’s why it was a little less stressful than states.”

Their hard work paid off, as they were awarded a gold medal after scoring 96.6 out of 100 points on their presentation. “Placing gold at nationals would probably be the best accomplishment of my life. It was an honor to compete against so many other people and to see their projects,” Togami expressed.

Ambrosecchio and Togami credited their success to Ludwig and Karla Deguchi, FCCLA co-adviser. “Deguchi spent time during class and after school helping us create our lesson plans and presentation, Ludwig helped us with the finances of the trip and she helped us work on our presentation of our project,” Togami said. Ambrosecchio added, “Ludwig and Deguchi were amazing advisers throughout this whole process and without their support our project wouldn’t have been a success.”

Both Ambrosecchio and Togami will take the knowledge they learned through FCCLA with them to college as they both plan to major in elementary education.