COAL TOWNSHIP - Five students from the Northumberland County Career and Technology Center's Culinary Arts class are hoping to raise enough funds to allow them to compete at a national competition later this summer.
Students Brianne Ramer, Samantha Harper, Joe Lolla, Brittany Gerth and Ashley Geiswhite will be participate at the Family, Career and Community Leaders of America (FCCLA) National Leadership Conference, July 8-14 in Anaheim, Calif. The students of culinary arts instructor James Schiavoni earned the trip with their strong showing at the state convention March in Lancaster.
Geiswhite and Gerth earned a silver medal for their "Food Innovations" project, while Harper, Lolla and Ramer participated and presented in the team event "Promote and Publicize FCCLA," earning a silver medal.
"They have been working for months on their projects and now they will be working and tweaking their presentations for the upcoming competitions," Schiavoni said. "Nationals is much more than the competition though. You meet a lot of great people and students and learn a lot."
For their project to promote and publicize the organization, Harper, Lolla and Ramer created flyers and even spoke with radio stations to promote the organization.
"We learned a lot through this project, the biggest thing being how to talk in front of people," Harper said. "We listened to an inspirational speaker at the conference and that really helped us."
In the Food Innovations category, Geiswhite and Gerth created a new dish, "Chicken Supreme," and did research on how the product would sell, including doing focus groups and testing on the dishes with their fellow students.
Those attending the conference are currently conducting fundraisers to help raise the money to get them to Anaheim. They have already conducted a hoagie sale, and plans are in the works to hold a spaghetti dinner and a bake sale in the near future.
Those wishing to make a donation for the trip can do so through the school's Upward Education Foundation. Call the school at 644-0304.