A Word of Thanks
The SkillsUSA National Leadership and Skills Conference was held on June 1-5, 2026 at the Georgia World Congress Center. There was also a TECHSPO which is SkillsUSA’s version of a World Workplace style EXPO. The TECHSPO and competitions occupied the entire exhibition space in Halls A, B, and C.
There were over 7,000 competitors in 115 competitions. These competitors were accompanied by teachers and chaperones for a total attendance of about 19,000 people.
One of the competitions was the FACILITHON – Leadership in Facility Management which had representatives from 17 states at the High School level and 4 states at the College, Post-Secondary level. Georgia had a representative in each of these competitions. The FMPipeline Team ran the FACILITHON contest and had a booth in the TECHSPO to promote Facility Management as a career opportunity to all the attendees.
I want to say a word of thanks to the following members of IFMA Atlanta who gave of their time and talents to support this effort.: Billy Holder, Cheryl Waybright, Clara Smith, DeWayne Roberson, Eunhwa Yang, Greg Klima, Julio Gonzalas, Kenny Kelly, Kim Richards, Lis West, Matt Dawson, Morgan Cohen and Thoman Videki. We could not have accomplished this without you
I also want to thank IFMA Atlanta who made a cash donation to the FMPipeline Team to help pay travel expenses for students from Georgia who will participate in the FACILITHON contest next year.
Finally, I want to recognize Alexyss Ortega from Georgia Piedmont Technical College who won the Gold Medal in FACILITHON. She is the first Gold Medalist in FACILITHON from Georgia. Congratulations to Alexyss!!!
Ken Stephenson RCFM
