Grand Forks Central students win awards in state SkillsUSA competition

Pamela Knudson, Grand Forks Herald
·2 min read

Apr. 23—GRAND FORKS — Six students from Grand Forks Central High School won awards at the 50th Annual North Dakota SkillsUSA Leadership and Skills Conference held earlier this month in Bismarck.

More than 500 students competed in 40 occupational and leadership skill areas, according to a Grand Forks school district spokesperson. The theme of this year's conference was "No Limits."

Grand Forks Central students who received medals are: Faith Tuinder, gold medal in advertising design; Colby Belzer, gold medal for computer programming; Owen Benware, silver, for electrical construction wiring; Micheal Wanschaffe, gold, and Ethan Thomas, silver, for information technology services; and Adam Thorvilson, gold, for technical drafting.

Tuinder, Belzer, Wanschaffe and Thorvilson qualified for the SkillsUSA national competition scheduled for June in Atlanta, Georgia.

Other Grand Forks Central students who participated in the competition were Bradley Salberg and Jaden Schwan in cabinetmaking, Brody and McCain Kendall in carpentry, and Sophia Hazle in technical drafting.

The 11 Grand Forks Central students who competed the conference also participated as voting delegates.

During the conference, student attendees heard a talk by motivational speaker Pat Bertagnolli, executive director of Job Service North Dakota. He spoke about his approach to community building and how together North Dakota residents can make a difference to overcome workforce challenges.

The student group was accompanied by their advisers: Paul Strande, who teaches building trades and woodworking courses; Nate Carlson, engineering and drafting; Cynthia Boehm, graphic design; and Zach Buchhop, information technology.

SkillsUSA is a national organization that serves trade, industrial, technical and health occupations students in public high schools, career and technical centers and schools, and two-year colleges. More than 320,000 students belong to the group, which is organized at more than 3,600 schools in 50 states and four U.S. territorial associations.