Meet Your Executive Board

National Student Organizations (NSO) has been growing widely on campus over the years. For an organization so large, it takes a team to help it stay organized. For this reason, the NSO executive board was created at Johnson & Wales University. The executive board helps NSO stay on track and keeps the student body informed by attending monthly meetings with the NSO advisors, helping plan and organize all events and socials within NSO, and discussing what is happening in each chapter of the organization. While accomplishing all these tasks, the executive board also gives feedback from students to the NSO advisors and relays information back to the student body. NSO is an organization known for taking great strides towards success and the students on the executive board are no different.

Name: Anthony Henry

Hometown: Danbury, CT

High School Affiliated Chapter: DECA

JWU NSO Division: Community Action Association

JWU Major: Finance

Year: 2016

What’s your best NSO memory (high school or college)?

The best NSO memory that I have took place at the end of freshman year when I took a trip to Australia with CAA (Community Action Association). Taking a trip to Australia was always one of my dreams, but I never thought that it would be possible until I joined this organization.

Name: Elena Melekos

Hometown: Hopatcong, NJ

High School Affiliated Chapter:  SkillsUSA

JWU NSO Division: Leadership Academy

JWU Major: Counseling Psychology

Year:  2016

Do you relate you NSO knowledge or skills back into your studies in any way?

 I definitely have related every aspect of SkillsUSA into my studies. From the professionalism, time management, to the public speaking. As a Counseling Psychology major, being professional, keeping track and being on time are essentials to helping your clients and yourself stay organized.  

Name: Nicholas Kalas

Hometown: Mount Olive

High School Affiliated Chapter: DECA

JWU NSO Division: Competitive Events Institute

JWU Major: Business Administration

Year: 2016

Any advice to incoming or new NSO students who are looking to get involved?

Get involved in as much as you can! It looks great on a résumé and can open so many doors and opportunities.

 

Name: Ashley Fudala

Hometown: Manchester, New Hampshire

High School Affiliated Chapter:  DECA

JWU NSO Division: Communications Association

JWU Major: Sports/Event/Entertainment Management

Year: 2016

What got you to be involved with NSO (any chapter) in high school and then carry that over to college?

 In high school many of my friends were involved with DECA and I would always hear about all of the amazing experiences they had at competitions and conferences. This made me want to experience it for myself. DECA played a huge part in my senior year of high school and I wanted to continue competing and making more connections with other DECA members so I chose to stay involved with DECA in college.

Washington Leadership Training Institute

On September 21-25^th, SkillsUSA RI State Vice President Elena Melekos, attended the Washington Leadership Training Institute (WLTI) in Washington DC. The event was a five day program where the members of SkillsUSA were trained on leadership skills, professionalism, and citizenship. While in Washington the students and advisors attended sessions that covered areas such as the impact of an individual citizen, leadership, employability skills, and many others.

At this year’s WLTI training nearly 380 students represented almost every state across the country. Most of the students that attended are state officers and had to apply to attend the week of events. As a part of the training the students got to visit the SkillsUSA National Headquarters, the Arlington Cemetery, and the Pentagon 9/11 Memorial; at each destination a ceremony was hosted. While in DC every state and their officer teams had a chance to present to Congressmen and Senators on SkillsUSA and the Perkins grant which funds vocational-technical education for students in secondary and postsecondary education.

                The seven secondary officers and Elena, the postsecondary officer for Rhode Island, had the opportunity to meet with Congressman Jim Langevin’s Education Aide Sam Morgante, Senator Jack Reed, and Senator Sheldon Whitehouse. Every state officer had the chance to thank them for supporting SkillsUSA and technical education as well as sharing their personal story within SkillsUSA.

Throughout the week the students all worked on their Statesman Awards. This award recognizes students who have demonstrated and have mastered leadership skills and certain requirements throughout the WLTI. At the end of the week countless memories had been made and friendships that will last a life time had been created. The week was without a doubt an incredible opportunity that helped individuals to grow as leaders and people.  

A Trip to Launch!

On January 15, 2014 National Student Organization sponsored a trip to Launch Trampoline Park. If you have not had a chance to go there yourself then just picture 10,000 square feet of indoor trampolines ready to be jumped on. Not only was there angled trampoline walls, but trampoline dodge ball, and a foam pit that any person who was brave enough could jump in to. Now take all of that and a group of energetic college kids and you can bet we had a good time.

            While jumping around for an hour was fun, it also made people hungry. Lucky for us, the evening also included pizza and drinks! Usually, people tend to shy away from pizza that comes out of a concession stand, but the food was surprisingly good and the perfect way to end the night. While all of this was great, another benefit of the event was that it was made for a college student’s budget, meaning it was free. The event also did a great job at bringing all members of NSO together. Whether you were in SkillsUSA, DECA, or any of the other divisions of NSO the event gave you the opportunity to meet people in other areas. All in all, the trip was fun, the food was good, and the people were nice.

Katherine Cook

Advertising and Marketing Communications

Class of 2016

JWU Competes at Regionals

Congratulations to the students who competed in regionals. 

The following students placed in the competition:

Accounting:    
Emmanneull Marseille- 3^rd place

Corporate Financial:    
Tyler Guy- 4^th place

Fashion Merchandising and Marketing:    
 Kathryn Sterbens- 1^st  place
Rosemeire Ribeiro-  2^nd  place

Restaurant and Food Service Management:    
Robert Santa-1^st Place

Travel and tourism:     
 Kathleen Sands-1^st place

Business to Business Marketing:   
 Victoria Lascari & Marisa Carey-3^rd place

Inernational Marketing:    
 Chris Zurwell & John  Zurwell-3^rd place

 Emily Hattub & Rececca Scarpato-4^th place

Sports and Entertainment Marketing:    
 Morgan Thompson & Scott Orwig-1^st place

 Nicole Kadushin & Megan Dumas-3^rd place 

 Lauren Ford & Sonia Ngo-8^th place

Sales Manager Meeting:     Beau Cobb-1^st place

                                                                             

SkillsUSA Competition Information