The Desert Oasis High School forensics team made their way to the SkillsUSA State Leadership and Skills Conference, where they went on to receive first place!

The state championship was held from April 9-12 in Reno, Nevada. The SkillsUSA conference is an annual event that gives students the ability to use hands-on skills in over 130 occupational areas. Desert Oasis Junior and gold medalist Justin Hartshorm commented,

“We started pretty early. First we took a written test. It was about 15 questions about our basic knowledge on the crime scene. then we went to the crime scene, went over the briefing, and then started.” 

Under supervision of SkillsUSA advisor, Ms. Cheryl Dewit, the Desert Oasis forensic team competed against 8 additional teams, successfully gaining a silver, bronze, and 3 gold medals. Our golden diamondbacks are Martha Elvira, Emelia Iringan and Justin Hartshorm. In the Job skills demonstration event, Gabriela Elvira received a silver medal and Karishma Sharma earned bronze. 

Success is not easily obtained, the forensic science team has been hard at work in order to achieve these placements,” We do a lot of practicing after school and we work with other students” claimed Hartshorm, “ we don’t only use our team we work with others to go through and teach them what we would do and to help them understand how to do it.”

But the struggle is yet to be over, from June 24th-28th the SkillsUSA National Leadership and Skills Conference (NLSC) will be held. This event is annually held in Atlanta, Georgia. When asked about preparations Hartshorm said,” last year, we brought in like an actual CSI agent. So I believe we might bring in another CSI agent to help us run through how they would do it again.”

We are extremely proud of these Diamondbacks and wish them the best at nationals this summer!