Pictured left to right, are robotics team members Josie Sigars, Connor Hershely, Haden Wright, Lucas Berning; and Instructor Rick Sharp.

Two SkillsUSA teams from North Central Missouri College earned top honors in the Missouri SkillsUSA State Leadership Award Ceremony, held Saturday, April 11, at State Technical College of Missouri in Linn.

NCMC was well represented, with the team of Lucas Berning and Haden Wright earning third place, and the team of Josie Sigars and Connor Hershely capturing first place honors. By earning first place, Sigars and Hershely qualify to compete in the National SkillsUSA Leadership Contest, scheduled for June 1–5, in Atlanta.

“The students demonstrated exceptional skills throughout the competition and scored close to a perfect score,” said Rick Sharp, Industrial Technology instructor at North Central Missouri College and coach of the teams. “They are a great example of what can be achieved in just two years at a community college, and we expect them to be very successful at the national competition in Atlanta.”

The SkillsUSA Robotics State competition was held at North Central Missouri College Savannah Campus on April 3. The competition challenged two-person teams to apply advanced technical knowledge, problem-solving ability and teamwork in a simulated industrial environment. Using industry-standard best practices, participants integrated a six-axis industrial robot with multiple peripherals, including programmable logic controllers, motorized components and industrial sensors.

Teams were also required to document their process, configure and program the robotic system and present their completed solution to a panel of judges.

Judging was based on technical accuracy, operational efficiency, speed, quality of documentation and team collaboration; key competencies that mirror real-world industrial automation environments.