NPSS teens excel in robotics, place 4th nationally in Skills Canada competition

FORT ST. JOHN, B.C. — Two local high school students placed fourth in the entire country at the Skills Canada National Competition in the Mobile Robotics category.

Josh Coenders and Nolan Cote from North Peace Secondary School (NPSS) competed in the competition throughout May 30th and 31st, with guidance from their teacher, Brant Churchill.

Churchill and Coenders appeared on the June 14th edition of This Week in the Peace to discuss the team’s performance. 

Churchill says this year’s competition was themed after maple taffy, to commemorate the fact it was being held in Quebec.

“They actually had to build two robots to interact with the arena, get out ‘maple sap,’ which was actually small golf balls, and deliver them to another location, and move some things around the arena” Churchill explained.

“It was all timed, and they were competing head-to-head against kids from other provinces.”

Coenders says one of the largest and most consistent challenges was ensuring their robot was resilient, and keeping it operating at 100 per cent efficiency for the entire competition.

“We had partners, even in the school, like another competing team, and then other teams provincially, that were doing very well, just as well as us,” Coenders says. “However, their downfall in the end was that they couldn’t keep a consistent score.”

He says during the provincial competition held a few weeks prior in Abbotsford, another team from NPSS scored better at times but failed to move on to the national level due to occasional breakdowns.

“We figured that resilience and consistency was very much a key, so using methods to keep the robots consistent — fail-safes, different ways to structure the code, things to avoid glitches and jamming in the machinery and stuff — was definitely paramount.”

The head-to-head competition was structured as a round-robin where all participants competed on the first day, followed by a double-elimination bracket on the second day, where Coenders and Cote finished fourth overall.

“North Peace has done pretty well competition-wise over the years, and these guys are the best we’ve ever done at nationals,” Churchill says. “This is our fourth time at nationals, and our highest mark, which is fourth place.”

Coenders, who says he plans to pursue a career in engineering after high school, says it’s “reassuring” to have performed so well at the competition.

“With something as involved and complex and hands-on as engineering, you never really know if you’re any good at it until you actually try it,” Coenders says. 

“It’s very reassuring to see that we have some competency, enough to place fourth in all of Canada.”

To view the full episode of This Week in the Peace featuring Churchill and Coenders, look below.