Everyone has a different set of skills and talents, such as sports, music or academics. At Stillwater Area High School, there are students who excel at construction and welding. On Friday, April 10, a group of welders bused over to Ridgewater College in Willmar, Minnesota to compete in a competition known as Minnesota Skills USA.

Skills USA has helped many young adults along the paths of their careers, and has served more than 10.5 million members since its founding in 1965.

Todd Kapsner teaches in the Industrial Technology department and was also the supervisor of the welders that attended the competition.

“Minnesota Skills USA is a national organization that looks at developing skills in multiple technical areas by giving students the chance to demonstrate those skills,” explained Kapsner.

Teacher Laurie McKenzie is the assisting supervisor with Kapsner and overlooked the competition with him. She explained MN Skills USA further as, “… it gives students working in the trades, which could be nursing, construction or an electrician, an opportunity to work with the knowledge they’ve been given.”

Kapsner offered up this opportunity to students in his classes: to compete against college-level metal workers to create a grill in under six hours. Out of all the students in his class, three of them decided to go: sophomores Garrett Stotts, Jake Lueders and Nick Sonnek.

“[On the day of the competition] we got here around five a.m. and bussed to Willmar and arrived at around 7:30 a.m.,” said Lueders.

Skills USA is organized in different levels known as “chapters”. It has a state chapter and a local chapter, which is what we have here at the high school. The competition was placed at the state level as it included our team and a half dozen others from in-state colleges, such as Superior.

Kapsner explained, “The objective of this competition was to demonstrate their welding skills. It’s a Metals class that they are in, and one of the things they learn in there is welding and the Skills USA looks at different types of welding processes, and using those different processes they have to incorporate them into the project, and then they get scored on how well they do with the different techniques that they use.”

The team had to pull their knowledge together to construct a perfectly functioning grill in under six hours, which was hard for the team to accomplish as they hadn’t been the most prepared.

“We should have practiced it a lot more, and figured out what we were going to do ahead of time instead of pulling it together last minute,” said Lueders.

However, the team worked hard together and managed to finish the grill just barely under the six hour limit. Luckily, the results turned out in their favor as they got first place.

“Pretty good for high schoolers,” said Lueders.

Skills USA offers amazing opportunities to students who want to challenge themselves and test out possible career choices to them. The U.S. Department of Labor noted the program as a “successful model of employer-driven youth development training program.” Many people have benefited from their experiences at competitions as they have developed skills they can use in their everyday lives. Teachers give their students these opportunities throughout the entire school year, so students should take a chance and go out to see what opportunities lie ahead of them.