Cheney Middle School business students travel to state

Cheney Middle School Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) students spent a majority of their spring break in Bellevue, April 4–7 competing against 1,800 students across the state at the FBLA State Business Leadership Conference (SBLC).

According to a news release, this is the sixth year CMS FBLA has competed at state, and were one of only five middle schools in Washington to go up against both middle school and high school students.

"Our chapter had 18 middle school students in seventh and eighth-grade attend and compete at the conference," CMS FBLA advisor Leah Silvieus wrote in an email. "Out of our competitors, 10 different students placed within the top 10 in their events a total of 17 times."

Highlights for the CMS chapter at the conference included Audrey Schlotter placing first in both community service project (middle level) and elevator speech, and Conner Barsness first in multimedia and website design. Both seventh-grade students earned automatic entry to the FBLA National Conference in Baltimore, Md., June 29–July 2.

Also placing at Bellevue were Aubrey Reynolds, second in "Pitch-It!," a state-only event;

Jonathan Ramsey and Cameron Teresi ninth in network design (against high school student teams) and Toivo Tomlinson-Ryan placed in all three of his events: business and financial math (fourth), career exploration (ninth) and introduction to computer science and coding (third).

Additional placings went to Mia Baldwin (third, business and financial math; seventh career exploration), Barsness (fifth, career exploration), Reina Gerber (ninth, business and financial math; seventh Pitch-It!), Ashley Larson (sixth, mock interview - state only event), Rebecca Purviance (eighth, Pitch-It!), Jonathan Ramsey (ninth, network design), Reynolds (sixth, career exploration) and Cameron Teresi (ninth, network design).

Cheney Middle School was also recognized for increasing its chapter membership by 10 percent this year.