SkillsUSA Students Connect with Community and Advocate for Career and Technical Education during SkillsUSA Week

Media Contacts for SkillsUSA:
Jane Short or Karen Kitzel, 703-777-8810
Email: jshort@skillsusa.org or kkitzel@skillsusa.org

Efforts Support Workforce Development, Closing the Skills Gap

Leesburg, Va., Feb. 5, 2024 — SkillsUSA, one of the nation’s largest student organizations, announced plans for SkillsUSA Week to be celebrated Feb. 5-9, 2024, as part of Career and Technical Education Month. Career and technical education and SkillsUSA are a vital solution to our nation’s growing skills gap. At a time when opportunity for employment is critical, SkillsUSA ensures students are equipped with the skills to successfully enter the workforce.

SkillsUSA Week annually highlights more than 380,000 SkillsUSA members and promotes career and technical education throughout the country, with more than 4,000 schools invited to participate. SkillsUSA is one of nine U.S. career and technical student organizations (CTSOs).

SkillsUSA Week activities at the local level include school tours and open houses, community service events, presentations to school boards, business leaders and legislators and interviews with the media. SkillsUSA Week is held each year in February, in conjunction with Career and Technical Education Month. Students at SkillsUSA schools nationwide have planned events to discuss opportunities in the skilled trades as they demonstrate their SkillsUSA Framework skills and carry out their chapter’s Program of Work.

“SkillsUSA Week is a time to lift up our students and recognize educators and business partners who bolster support for local programs that define student excellence,” says SkillsUSA’s executive director, Chelle Travis. “SkillsUSA is a talent pipeline that graduates 100,000 SkillsUSA students each year who strive to be career-ready on the first day of their job. SkillsUSA Week is one of our most important weeks of the year and a highlight for our students.”

As part of 2024 SkillsUSA Week, the 10-student national officer team will visit the U.S. Department of Education on Feb. 8 for Advocacy Day to meet with Secretary Miguel Cardona and his team followed by legislative visits on Capitol Hill. During the week, one group of students will visit SkillsUSA Aerotek in Frederick, Md., while a second group of national officers will meet Carhartt and Tractor Supply Company (TSC) representatives at the TSC store in Hendersonville, Tenn. to accept their check for the Support the Trades campaign. Two national officers will also travel to Mississippi to thank partner John Deere, who is the official sponsor for SkillsUSA Week this year. For more about SkillsUSA Week and to see our national photo album of events, go to: www.skillsusa.org/events/skillsusa-week/.

About SkillsUSA

SkillsUSA is America’s proud champion of the skilled trades. It’s a student-led partnership of education and industry that’s building the skilled workforce our nation depends on with graduates who are career ready, day one. Representing more than 380,000 career and technical education students and teachers, SkillsUSA chapters thrive in middle schools, high schools and college/postsecondary institutions nationwide. SkillsUSA’s mission empowers students to become skilled professionals, career-ready leaders and responsible community members. That mission is accomplished through the SkillsUSA Framework of Personal Skills, Workplace Skills and Technical Skills Grounded in Academics, which is integrated into classroom curriculum. Through Framework instruction, students develop the character-shaping leadership skills — teamwork, communication, professionalism and more — that successful careers and lives demand. At the same time, students hone their high-level technical skills against current industry standards in more than 130 skilled trade areas, from 3-D Animation to Welding. The result? Focused, confident and highly skilled graduates who are ready to work, ready to lead and ready to make a difference in our schools, workplaces and communities. A vital solution to the skills gap, where more in-demand skilled trades positions are available than qualified professionals to fill them, SkillsUSA has served more than 14.6 million difference-making members since 1965. For more, visit www.skillsusa.org.