Powder River Examiner -

By Libby Nisley, BPA Advisor

Both the Junior High and High School BPA students traveled to Baker for a regional contest on Monday, December 6th. The contest boasted around 175 participants from Baker, Forsyth, Custer, Plevna, Hardin, St. Labre, and Lodge Grass. We had 25 members competing from our chapters, and we fared quite well.

Our Senior member and chapter President Lea Aye placed 1st in Advanced Word, 1st in Health Administration Procedures, 2nd in Advanced Office, 2nd in Medical Terminology and 6th in Fundamental Accounting. She was also a part of Admin Support Team #1 with Marcus and Mia Mader and Becca Aye that took 2nd Place and the Parli Pro Team that placed 1st with the same folks, plus April Wood. She had a very nice regionals indeed!

Junior members did quite well too. Lauryn Billing & Tytan Hanson placed 1st in Financial Analyst Team. In addition to this honor, Lauryn placed 2nd in Health Administration Procedures, 3rd in Fundamental Accounting, 4th in Financial Math Analysis, and 3rd in Admin Support Concepts. Tytan placed 5th in Fundamental Accounting and 5th in Financial Math Analysis. Marcus Mader placed 2nd in Integrated Office to go along with his stellar team performances. April Wood placed 5th in Basic Office. Lucinda Cain placed 4th in Advanced Word, 4th in Business Meeting Management, and 6th in Management/Marketing/HR Concepts. Finally, Mercy Brost placed 2nd in Interview Skills, 2nd in Fundamental Accounting, 1st in Admin Support Concepts and 1st in Management/Marketing/HR Concepts.

A great group of sophomores are participating this year too. Grayson Arithson took 1st in Business Meeting Management, 3rd in Management/Marketing/HR Concepts, 4th in Parli Pro Concepts and 5th in Health Administration Procedures. Graci Barbero took 2nd in Advanced Accounting and 4th in Intermediate Word. Matt Hansen took 3rd in Extemporaneous Speech and 4th in Management/Marketing/HR Concepts. Eli Heacock placed 2nd in Digital Marketing Concepts and 6th in Business Meeting Management. Mia Mader took 3rd in Advanced Spreadsheet and 6th in Intermediate Word in addition to her great team performances. Ciara McDowell placed 2nd in Advanced Spreadsheet, 5th in Integrated Office and 5th in Intermediate Word. Josh Rasmussen placed 6th in Legal Office Procedures and Brandon Rogers placed 2nd in Intermediate Word. Zeason Schaffer placed 1st in Advanced Spreadsheet and 3rd in Intermediate Word. Finally, Cooper Zimmer placed 1st in Intermediate Word and 4th in Advanced Spreadsheet.

A group of three freshmen participated this year. Becca Aye placed in Nationals last year in both Middle Level Keyboarding and Spreadsheet, and at the High School level this year was able to help the Administrative Support and Parli Pro Teams do very well. Maddie Zimmer placed 7th in Fundamental Accounting and was right on the edge of immediate qualification for State. Finally, Rebekah Rasmussen had a fine day indeed with a 5th place finish in Fundamental Spreadsheet, 4th in Admin Support Concepts, 2nd in Management/Marketing/HR Concepts, 4th in Digital Marketing Concepts, and 5th in Medical Terminology Concepts.

Middle Level only has 4 members this year, but they represented well. Justin Aye placed 5th in Keyboarding Production, 2nd in Spreadsheet Applications, 1st in Computer Literacy Concepts, and 5th in Business Fundamentals. Kassie Hagedorn placed 6th in Keyboarding Production and 6th in Spreadsheet Applications, 5th in Computer Literacy Concepts and 2nd in Business Fundamentals. Kayleigh Opstedahl placed 4th in Keyboarding Production, 4th in Business Fundamentals, and 4th in Extemporaneous Speech. Finally Kensi Emmons joined the group to place 1st in Administrative Support Team.

I look forward to taking students to Billings March 13-15th for State Competition. Nationals, for those who qualify, will be in Dallas May 4-8. Finally, thank you to Charlanne Lemke for her continued support as a Co-Advisor and Raquel Mader for her assistance as a chaperone at regionals. All competitions are currently scheduled to be "in person" which is a huge step above the virtual competitions last year. It should be fun!