Lillian Esagoff staff writer
Defne Onal staff writer

On April 17, students from KBEV participated in the SkillsUSA competition and received gold and silver while working against other schools and competing. 

The producer of KBEV, Romeo Carey, gave this opportunity to allow his students to perform the tasks assigned throughout the competition. The students had two teams to collaborate and talk with each other via zoom to create the final result. In the past five years, this was the first time KBEV made it to state in broadcast and journalism. 

Each person who competed had a different role assigned to them during the competition. Sophomore Sarah Hoorfar “chose the graphics and made sure they aligned with the theme of the script.” Senior Ricky Lee was in “charge of technical operations and team organization” and also registering students pre-competition. Senior Sophie Bednarsh was the floor manager meaning she directed the anchors. 

“I think the hardest part was knowing that even if we were to advance we wouldn’t be able to get the full  experience… since we were working together virtually. Since we made it to nationals, which we haven’t done in a while as a school, it just kind of sucks that we can’t fly to where nationals would be and compete in person,” Bednarsh said. 

Following COVID-19 guidelines also proved to be a challenge. 

“For the intro we wore SkillsUSA masks… and on the rundown we added a two second graphic after the intro segment and before the closing segment so that we can take off masks and move spots,” Hoorfar said. 

Although there were some challenges, Lee thinks that his team has handled the competition well. 

“My team and I had so much fun throughout the process- hours of meeting over Zoom to write a script, filming a newscast in the studio while maintaining safety guidelines, and participating in the all-virtual competition,”Lee said. “It definitely was different and even felt awkward in some sense, but I had extremely talented teammates.”

Ricky’s team placed gold (1st place) in Broadcast News Production, and KBEV’s students who competed in this state competition placed silver in Broadcast News Production, gold in Audio/Radio Production, silver in Television (TV) Production, and bronze in Job Demonstration. 

“Of course, winning a gold medal at a competition is always fun. Even though this is my third year competing in this competition, it never gets tedious. But more importantly, I think all the medals that students swept proves the excellence of our media program and my leadership.” Lee said. “We’ve proven that KBEV can do amazing stuff as a team, even during this challenging time.”