The Four Corners Upper School chapter of Health Occupations Students of America (HOSA) secured three wins at the Heartland Regional competition on January 18th.
HOSA is a global student-led organization that aims to empower future health professionals.
The FCUS chapter of HOSA had around 23 students competing, however only three attended the competition in person.
“We had three students who went to the competition and around 20 students who competed through an online test,” HOSA adviser Kristen Fendone stated.
HOSA has several different categories within the competition. Junior Riley Cresswell who attended the event in person entered the Research Poster category.
“I entered the research poster category where I picked a question and polled my peers on their experiences for my poster. I needed my poster printed out and a suit to compete in for the presentation part. I also used note cards to help me when competing,” Cresswell explained.
Cresswell joined HOSA as she plans to be a nurse after high school. Although the results may not have been her favorite, she feels that the competition did give her a good opportunity to start doing things related to the medical field.
“I joined HOSA to get experiences in the medical field like the competition,” Cresswell said.
While HOSA is meant as a club for students who plan to pursue a health-related occupation in the future such as Cresswell, junior Daniely Gonzalez was able to take regionals as an opportunity to further her photography work.
“Most of the time I do sports photography and before the competition, I had never taken photos of a professional setting. Being able to go out to different clinics helped me to better understand proper photography techniques,” Gonzalez stated.
Gonzalez’s challenge for the competition was to put together a portfolio of photos and descriptions of three people who work in the medical field.
“In HOSA there are various types of competitions including Health Carrer Photography. For this competition, I had to take photos of three different medical professions and write one page for each and explain what the career is, what type of education the career requires, benefits and disadvantages of the career, and a unique fact. I then had to present this to four judges at the convention,” Gonzalez explained.
Gonzalez ended up being the big winner of the day as she took home first place in the Health Career Photography category.
“I knew I was a good photographer, but since I had never done health career photography I was nervous. Plus many students who were at the convention had been in HOSA for so much longer than me and having other schools that we were competing against having nursing classes that our school doesn’t offer made me feel like I didn’t have a high chance,” Gonzalez explained.
Gonzalez started preparing for the competition two weeks before. While Gonzalez took home the win, she regrets not preparing sooner.
“I started preparing around two weeks before. I was rushing all over to get photos and get consent forms signed, I even finished up the end of my speech at the convention. Overall, I feel that if I had more time I would have been able to prepare better and even look at minor mistakes I made in the portfolio and fix them before the convention,” Gonzalez said.
Junior Suri Lopez also took home a prize as she won second place in the Healthcare Issues Exam out of hundreds of students who tested.
“Suri took an online test along with all of the other students in the Heartland region and she placed second out of all of the students testing which was in the hundreds,” Fendone explained.
The youngest winner of the day was sophomore Gabrielle Destine who came in fourth place in the Dental Science category.
“It was surprising because I know that I had studied really hard but I didn’t think I would make it because I still didn’t know some of the details everyone else did. I feel like knowing that I can place I want to continue with my HOSA journey and become an orthodontist,” Destine said.
Destine chose to compete in the Dental Science category as she wants to pursue dental work as a career.
“I want to be an orthodontist, and I feel like HOSA is a healthcare system that can help me achieve my goals and help me become an orthodontist,” Destine stated.
For this specific category, Destine had to first pass the Dental Science Examination.
“I had to study a lot. I had to complete a 50 motherfricking question test and it was super hard I didn’t even think I would pass. I saw my name on the Schoology winners board that Fendone put out and that’s when I knew I actually had to study,” Destine said.
During the competition, Destine had to identify and talk about several dental tools.
“At the competition they made us go through a beginning speech ceremony and then they took us to our room and I had super bad anxiety. During the test we had to describe and identify different dental instruments,” Destine stated.
This was Destine’s first time competing at a HOSA competition and did not believe she would place in the competition.
“I did not have high hopes and did not believe that I was going to place. This being my first year in HOSA I thought that it would be the officers who would pass so when that did not happen, I was shocked that I did,” Destine explained.
After regionals, the winners of the HOSA competition get to attend states. Due to money issues, the FCUS chapter of HOSA will not be attending the competition.
“Due to funding, it would be very difficult for us to attend states. This was the regional test so the next would be states in Orlando. While we have tried to fundraise, we have not been able to fundraise enough to get to states,” Fendone stated.
