June 25, 2026
June 25, 2026
Melody Watkins was working part time as a lunch supervisor at her daughter's elementary school, in the thick of the pandemic, when she watched an electrician climb out of a school district van. She had no idea what he was there to fix. She just knew, watching him, that the job looked like the kind of work she wanted. She went home, looked into it, applied, and was registered to start the following winter.
A few years later, that gut decision looks like one of the smartest moves she could have made. We're proud to name Melody one of our 2026 Dakota Prep Fellows.
Before the pandemic, Melody had already built a career with her hands. She was a trained baker and a second chef in fine dining, work she genuinely loved for its intensity and its tight-knit crews. But fine dining runs on nights, weekends, and holidays, and for a mother raising a daughter, the math stopped adding up. The hours were punishing and the pay didn't match the demands. She wanted work that was just as hands-on and just as rewarding, but that could also support a family and a life outside the kitchen.
The trades offered exactly that: strong, stable pay, a clear path to a licensed career, and an industry that genuinely needed people. For Melody, the decision wasn't a leap into the unknown so much as a trade up.
What she didn't expect was how completely the work would suit her. Everything she had loved about a professional kitchen, she found again on the job.
"It was dirty, needed cleaning and organizational skills and was usually in a tight knit group. Each job would be finished and then I would move onto the next. Plenty of fulfillment!"
Her one real worry, going back to school as an older student, evaporated almost immediately. Half her class turned out to be around her age or older. And the deeper she got into the program, the bigger the trade revealed itself to be.
"I learned that electrical is not just receptacles, switches and bulbs. I discovered motor control part way through foundations and I absolutely loved it."
That discovery set her course. She moved into PLC programming and robotics, the technical heart of the trade, and found her ambition: a long-term career in industrial control, installing motor control centres, programming PLCs and relays, and troubleshooting the strange, satisfying problems that come with complex automation. What started as a practical decision had become a genuine passion.
Melody hasn't just adjusted to the trades. She's excelled at them. She finished her Level 2 technical training with a 90% standing, and at BCIT she earned something only a tiny fraction of students do: she was hired out of the Foundations program as a student employee, building the real control cabinets and training boards that other apprentices learn on.
Then she proved it on the biggest stage available to her. In April 2026, Melody won gold in the Electrical Wiring category at the Skills Canada BC Competition, beating out competitors from post-secondary programs across the province, and earned a place at the National Skills Canada Competition in Toronto. True to who she is, she framed the win as something bigger than herself.
"My time at BCIT has meant so much to me. I've learned from amazing instructors and classmates from BCIT Electrical who believed in me and helped me see what I was capable of. Winning gold at Skills BC felt like a shared achievement, and I'm so grateful for the training and support that helped get me here."
Her department head, Clarence Burlock, who has known her as both a student and an employee, puts it plainly in his recommendation:
"What impresses me most is her ability to inspire and engage others. Melody fosters a collaborative environment where team members feel valued and empowered to contribute their best work."
That gift for building a team is the heart of how Melody mentors. She doesn't believe the most useful thing she can do is tutor one classmate at a time. She believes in lifting the whole room, starting group chats so people can work through hard problems together, saying good morning to everyone, bringing in cookies to celebrate a brutal unit finally ending, and connecting classmates to each other so no one studies alone. She calls it a "no man left behind" mentality, and her logic is simple: great marks come from a great environment and a great support network. Build the second, and the first follows.
As a second-year apprentice, Melody knows the toughest stretch, the road to her Red Seal, is still ahead. That's where the Dakota Prep Fellowship comes in: full access to test prep and study materials for the exams to come, and a tuition grant to ease the way. True to form, she's already planning to share the hardest practice questions with her class group chats so the whole cohort levels up together.
Melody's story is a reminder that the trades aren't a consolation prize. For a working parent who needed better pay, better hours, and work worth doing, they were the upgrade. She's thriving, she's bringing others up with her, and she's exactly the kind of fellow Dakota Prep is proud to support.
Download now to access thousands of practice questions across electrical & plumbing for US and Canada
