There are three Okotoks students who could possibly join forces to build a gazebo, make a brochure to market the darn thing and then produce the spreadsheets to show a few marketing results.
Those three students are off to Halifax for the Skills Canada skills later this month after winning provincial qualifiers on May 8-9 in Edmonton.
Mac Simmonds, a Grade 11 student at Foothills Composite High School, won the carpentry competition in Edmonton.
“My goal was to get it finished and do well,” Simmonds said. “We had to build a kids gazebo, it was about four-feet by 6 ½ feet.”
He was given a pile of lumber and minimal instructions – not how to build it, but he got some measurements.
“I first organized my wood to make sure I knew what went where, so I wasn’t using longer pieces in the wrong places,” Simmonds said. “Then I started from the floor and built up.”
It’s true that good carpenters measure twice and cut once.
“I did that a lot,” he said with a smile. “A couple times during practices I made the wrong cuts that I didn’t make at provincials.”
Simmonds was able to finish on time.
“‘Slow is smooth and smooth is fast,’ that’s something my dad told me,” he said. “The second day when there was a lot to do, I was a little worried. Once the decking was done after that it was smooth sailing.”
He finished the project on time – keeping his work area clean to ensure he got his safety points.
He was happy with the finished product, he thought top four, maybe a spot on the podium, but not necessarily a trip to Nova Scotia.
“At first I was kind of in shock and I was kind of trembling,” he said. “At nationals I will try to work hard and try to get it done.”
He not only got tips from his handyman dad, but also from Comp construction teacher Cyril Reschny.
“Mr. Reschny shows you how you can do better, he gives you different tips and tricks,” said Simmonds, adding he would like to continue carpentry after graduating from the Comp.
Julie Hayward, a Grade 12 student with the Alberta High School of Fine Arts, won the graphic design competition.
“The first day I had to create a logo and a brochure for a cycling tour company (Mountain Mavericks),” she said. “It was nice because we used a lot of mountain-based stuff and a lot of cool coloured-palettes in there.”
The future graphic designers went into the competition with some information about the fictional company and Hayward had something in mind for the logo.
“It definitely changed because they provide us with a lot of images we could incorporate ourselves,” she said. “I ended up creating something that had mountains in it and a moose…”
With the logo completed, she said she was able to build and layout a brochure she was happy with.
“You’re incorporating your ideas of design and things,” she said. “It’s really cool because everybody has such unique styles and you get a glimpse of other people’s work and it’s cool how everybody does their own thing.”
She had a problem anyone with a computer can appreciate – the printers weren’t working.
“They figured it out and it was smooth sailing – but I did ask them if I would lose points and they said ‘no’.”s
The next day she had to create an iron-on for a backpack and the final assignment was creating a poster.
“The poster was definitely crunch time but I was really happy with it,” she said.
She was confident going into the competition but, “to hear my name called was amazing, there were a lot of tears afterwards.”
She credited graphics arts teacher Florlyn Doyle and Ben Stevens, Comm Tech teacher, for getting her ready.
She got a boost of confidence when Stevens saw her logo in Edmonton.
“That first night when she had finished the logo, I had picked it out of the field as the best without knowing whose it was,” Stevens said with a smile. “She said ‘that’s mine.’ And I said, “thank goodness.”
Meanwhile, Holy Trinity Academy Grade 10 student Kennedy Leggett was proving her prowess in winning the IT office applications at provincials.
“Basically it’s everything including Microsoft Office, and you have to business problems within it, such as building a logo, a spreadsheet with employees numbers’ – keep track of what they are selling,” Kennedy said.
The competition included work in Word, PowerPoint, Excel and Database.
PowerPoint proved to be the most difficult.
“For PowerPoint we had to create a slideshow that would sell our product and let people know that we changed our name and we had opened a new location,” Leggett said of her fictional company, Sweetcakes Bakery. “We had two hours to do it and we had to do two. The long one was hard it was more for formal big business presentation. It took up a lot of time.”
Her Excel had her completing a spreadsheet and graph with pertinent data.
“You just have to find the correct formulas and if you don’t know the formula it will always be a little tough,” Leggett said. “Once you know Excel it’s pretty easy to follow.”
She said there were one or two things she needed to figure out on her Database project, which showed how the fictional employees were doing in sales.
Leggett said teacher Louise Nivens helped her prepare for the competition.
