Homewood-Flossmoor High School senior Charley Dieringer took two first place honors at the SkillsUSA Illinois competition, and freshman Noah Johnson took fourth place in its Facilithon competition.

Their teacher, Bill Merchantz, accompanied them to the meet in April in Peoria. 

“They both did amazing,” he said. SkillsUSA Illinois focuses on workplace, personal and technical skills.

Dieringer won top honors in the CNC 2-Axis Lathe Programmer category and the CNC 3-Axis Milling Programmer competition. In 2025, Dieringer won the same first-place honors, and in 2024 he won first in the CNC 3-Axis competition.

Bill Merchantz said Dieringer has earned the right to compete at nationals in June. In 2025, he took second place in the nationals CNC 3-Axis Milling Programmer SkillsUSA competition in Atlanta.

A standard CNC 3-Axis milling machine has a table that moves the part to provide one or two planes of movement and a tool that provides the other one or two planes of movement. The machines are used for manufacturing various automotive parts, such as engine components and gearboxes.

Dieringer programmed the machine using G-code. He said the machine operates the opposite of a 3D printer: rather than creating a product, it is removing from the material he uses. The machine uses what would generally be considered drill bits, he said. 

Johnson competed in Facilithon, a new category at SkillsUSA Illinois. Merchantz said Facilithon “puts contestants through facility management scenarios to test them on how they would respond during varying solutions.” 

The Facilithon competition required Johnson to answer a 50-question common-sense quiz, a 10-minute Facility Management role play and a Facility Management Challenge of an emergency scenario that the student reacts to.