07/03/2026
Greetings from San Antonio, Texas, where Thomas W. Harvey and Heritage FBLA had 21 PCLS students qualify for and compete at the 2026 National Leadership Conference!
Each student had to place in the top four of their event at the state level in order to compete in the preliminary competitions at the national level.
We had 7 students advance to the final round of competitions, which means our students placed in the top two of their section of the preliminary round. Then they got to perform their presentations a second time in front of an audience and new finalist judges. Our finalists were:
Exploring Public Speaking (Jude Cannon)
Intro to Social Media Strategy (Scarlett Hull-Gollin, Maddie Orosky, Allison Murillo)
Visual Design (Alex Boskovic, Heather Perez, and Brenda Leon)
Jude Cannon placed in the top 12 in the nation for his event and was Heritage Middle School’s first ever NLC finalist in the chapter’s first year of existence.
Our Introduction to Social Media Strategy team placed 4th in the nation by creating an Instagram account with mental health tips for teens.
Our Visual Design team finished as the National runners-up by creating a model of a promotional booth for FBLA.
We are incredibly proud of all the students that traveled safely across the country to compete against the best in the nation in their events!
This program and experience would not have been possible without the generous funding from the Avery Dennison foundation and the Veale Youth Entrepreneurship Forum.
We would also like the thank the army of volunteer mentors from Avery Dennison and PCLS that helped to mentor our students throughout the year.
Advisers Natalie Green and Michael Wright would also like to thank Kristine Meldrum, Rhonda Schnipke, Shannon Green, and Dedra Evans for chaperoning this trip!