Tate proves he has the skills

By Lethbridge Herald on June 5, 2025.

Alejandra Pulido-Guzman
Lethbridge Herald

A local cabinet maker in the making will be representing Canada in the World Skills competition next year after winning first place in Skills Canada last week in Regina. 

Tate McGarry, who competed at the high school level in the cabinetmaking category last year and brought home a gold medal in the Skills Canada competition, has now won in the post-secondary level, earning a spot in the WorldSkills competition. 

“It was a bit similar to last year, but since it was at the college level this time everyone is a little bit better and more prepared, which was a bit trickier,” said McGarry. 

He added that this year he was representing the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology, as he is currently enrolled in the Cabinetmaker program there. 

“We built something called the campaign stand and it was over two days, six hours each day,” said McGarry. 

He said it was an exciting competition because it took place during a qualifying year, and now he has the opportunity to go to Shanghai, China next year to represent Canada. 

McGarry explained that this year, since he was no longer in high school, he didn’t have to go through a regional competition to qualify to provincials. He participated in the Alberta Skills competition, won gold, qualified to Skills Canada and now has qualified for WorldSkills. 

“The goal this year was to go to Worlds,” he said, “so when I did provincials, I had to try and make it to nationals, so after winning that I realized I got to go to worlds so that’s pretty cool.”

The Skills Alberta competition took place in May, Skills Canada took place last week and now McGarry will wait until September 2026 to take part in WorldSkills. 

“I got a full year to prepare for it now. I have a coach from SAIT now who’ll prepare me, and I think we will just try and do some run-throughs of previous year’s projects to get ready.”

While he is uncertain of what to do after World Skills, and he is enrolled in an apprenticeship program at SAIT, McGarry says he’ll continue to work at Fuzo Woodworks and Design here in Lethbridge, where he has been working since 2023.