Provided

Amarillo College teammates Andrew Gonzales and Daniel Guillen were unsurpassed in the Application Development competition at the United States Information Technology Collegiate Conference (USITCC) on April 1 in Plano.

The AC duo edged out the second- and third-place teams, both from Missouri State University, to capture a National Championship in their event.

“Through their hard work and preparation they demonstrated that the skills they are learning at Amarillo College are second to none,” said Chris George, instructor of computer information systems and cybersecurity at AC. “They proved that AC students can tackle real-world IT problems on a national stage.”

The Foundation for IT Education (FITE) conducted the annual USITCC at the Dallas/Plano Marriott at Legacy Town Center.

AC students who joined Gonzales and Guillen at the event were Xander Galusha, Carrie Nichols-Kayser, Tony Kayser, Andrew Munson and Daniel Alvarez-Vega. AC Faculty sponsors in attendance were Chris George and John Emery, an adjunct instructor of digital forensics.

Representing both AC’s Computer Information Systems Department and the Bash Script Crazy tech club, the AC students competed in Network Design, Application Development, Microsoft Office Solutions, PC Troubleshooting, Cybersecurity, and Database Design.

In all, 168 students representing 20 colleges and universities participated at the national event.

In addition to his championship effort in Application Development, Andrew Gonzales placed 17th in the Cybersecurity competition, in which Andrew Munson placed 26th and Carrie Nichols-Kayser placed 41st. “That means we had three people finish in the top 50 percent of the security competition,” George said.

“And Andrew Munson and Tony Kayser also placed in the top 25 percent in PC Troubleshooting,” he added, “so we feel like we gave a very good account of ourselves at this competition and represented AC with gracious professionalism.”

Attending Colleges and Universities