I rise today to recognize a set of great achievements by a group of young people in my riding of Perth–Wellington. Earlier this month, a team of grade 7 and 8 students from St. Mary’s Catholic School in Listowel and a grade 10 student, Anne Doig, from St. Michael Catholic Secondary School in Stratford all won gold at the 2023 Skills Ontario Competition.

The student team from St. Mary’s competed in the Lego mechanical engineering category. Their project was to design and build a monorail. They worked tirelessly to perfect their skills in preparation for their competition.

Anne Doig from St. Michael competed in the aesthetics category, securing first place. This is the second consecutive year that Anne has won the gold medal in the Skills Ontario Competition for this category.

Thank you to the educators at both St. Mary’s and St. Michael for encouraging, supporting and advising these bright young students. Thank you to Skills Ontario for organizing this annual competition and for everything you do to prepare Ontario’s youth for the jobs of tomorrow.

The Skills Ontario Competition serves as an exceptional platform for these students to exhibit their skills across a diverse array of trades. Speaker, as the Premier says, a job in the skilled trades is a job for life.

Again, congratulations to the students of St. Mary’s and St. Mike’s on your resounding victories. This splendid achievement reflects not only upon yourselves but also on your schools and indeed our entire community.