Yellowknife, N.W.T. - High school and post-secondary students will be showing off their skills in sixteen trades and technology fields tomorrow as part of the Territorial Skills Competition.

The executive director of Skills Canada NWT, Jan Fullerton, said one aim of the competition is to get more young people from the North pursuing careers in the skilled trades.

"We have a strongly resource-based economy, so the trades become even more integral to our economic wealth and prosperity, so it's really great to promote these opportunities. And we also, of course, want to see the jobs in the North being filled by Northern workers, rather than needing to bring people in from other parts of Canada."

Students will be competing in fields ranging from hair styling to welding.

Fullerton said the competition projects are designed by an expert in the field to reflect industry standards and industry needs.

As an example, she described what the electrical wiring competition will entail.

"There's some mock walls set up, and they'll be given some schematics for how the walls should be wired, so they'll have to put on light switches and a fuse panel and run conduit between the two, and basically do as if they're wiring a small section of a house."

In most competitions the gold medalists will be invited to participate at the nationals in Edmonton in May.

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