Women Skilled Trades Students

While women’s participation in the Canadian skilled trades workforce has increased over the years, they are still severely underrepresented. Most women in trades are seen in the service sector (e.g., hairstyling, esthetics, and food) and on average, in all sectors, earn less than their male counterparts (Amery & Dubois, 2021). The wage gap is the largest for racialized women, trans women, newcomer women, and women with disabilities (Pay Equity Office, 2023).

Women make up 4.8% of construction apprentice registrations, but only 2% complete their apprenticeship, indicating there are significant barriers to women entering and completing apprenticeships (Jin et al., 2020). Overall, women experience higher attrition rates in apprenticeship programs compared to men for numerous reasons, some of which include harassment, isolation, discrimination, and hostility (Curtis et al., 2022). For women apprentices, some aspects of apprenticeships contribute to psychological and physiological stressors such as ill-fitting PPE (including boots, safety glasses, gloves, coveralls, and harnesses), physical overcompensation, lack of hands-on training, and unavailable sanitary bathroom facilities (Curtis et al., 2022). Currently, program completion for women apprentices remains lower than pre-COVID-19 rates sitting at around 36% (Canadian Apprenticeship Forum, 2024a).

Sexism and Sexual Assault

Sexual harassment can be understood as unwanted or unwelcome conduct and is deemed as being offensive, intimidating, degrading, and/or hostile (Bridges et al., 2022). Interviews with women trade students highlight their experience of sexual harassment with not only classmates but educators as well (Bridges et al., 2022). Whether it be comparisons of machinery parts to women’s bodies or lack of response to sexualized talk between male classmates, this complicit agreement and failure to intervene reinforces the normalization of this behaviour. This normalization makes it extremely difficult for women to navigate the trade environment and establishes the gendering of power relations (Bridges et al., 2022).

The feeling of being powerless to speak up and advocate for oneself, for fear of being let go or not believed, is perpetuated by workplace culture (Curtis et al., 2022). While women in male-dominated industries are more exposed to sexual misconduct, they are also less likely to name the conduct as sexual harassment (Bridges et al., 2022). This behaviour has become normalized as something to ‘just expect’ when working in a male-dominated industry, and to either brush it off, laugh it off, or dismiss it (Bridges et al., 2022). In most cases, women understand and acknowledge that this behaviour is unacceptable and not okay, but the culture demands them to be accepting and not take offense (Bridges et al., 2022).

Reasons a woman may not speak up about harassment include but is not limited to (Bridges et al., 2022):

For more information, visit CICMH’s Sexual Violence Response on Campus toolkit here.

Tokenism

Kanter’s theory of tokenism identifies the role organizational structures have in the difficulties minorities experience (Bridges et al., 2022). According to this theory, those who comprise less than 15% of a workplace and whose social identity is different from the dominant group are considered tokens (Kanter, 1977). This type of skewed ratio enables discrimination, marginalization, harassment, and social exclusion that is targeted at women who are in male-dominated industries* (Bridges et al., 2022).

*It should also be noted that tokenism also occurs with other groups such as 2SLGBTQIA+, people with disabilities, and ethnic minorities.

Kanter (1977) suggests that the dominant group utilizes three perpetual phenomena to enact this type of segregation:

Visibility – women stand out as different among the dominant group (male classmates/ colleagues) social exclusion and heightened visibility are implicated in high attrition

Polarization – exclusion of women is justified due to gender differences highlighting gendered differences insinuating that the female body is inferior

Assimilation – reducing the token group to stereotypes and generalizations stereotyping what women can and cannot do in the trades

To counteract tokenism, some tradeswomen have employed the strategy of ‘becoming one of the boys’. While this strategy can help reduce visibility and social exclusion, it does not help to achieve the protection they desire, has the potential to increase hostility, and may come at the expense of other minority groups (Bridges et al., 2022).

Stigma

It is traditionally expected that women in the trades will ‘toughen up’ and ‘fit in with the culture’ to quickly adapt to workplace norms. Despite an increase in women in trades, there is a perpetuating stigma that most skilled trades jobs should only be done by men and that they are too tough for women (Amery & Dubois, 2021). This perception that women do not ‘belong’ in the skilled trades is supported by data that demonstrates that women in trades are usually assigned lower-skilled tasks and are not presented with as many opportunities because they do not fit the ‘appearance’ of a tradesperson (Raza, 2023). Women (25%) are 10 times more likely to be discriminated against when finding an employer sponsor for their apprenticeship in comparison to men (2.5%) (Raza, 2023).

With the aging workforce quickly approaching, it is time to shatter the stereotypes and stigmas. There are no skills within the skilled trades (i.e., hand-eye coordination, balance, stamina, dexterity) that can be defined by gender. In a 2022 Canadian survey on awareness and views on women working in construction, gender bias remains strong as 64% of respondents said women face discrimination from employers and colleagues due to the idea that construction is a man’s job and that women do not fit into this type of ‘macho’ culture (BuildForce Canada, 2023).

Stigmas regarding ‘macho’ social norms, indicating that women cannot do certain jobs because of their body, is a potentially dangerous idea to push as this can sometimes pressure women to disregard safety measures and put themselves at risk to ‘prove’ themselves (Curtis et al., 2022). Psychological stressors such as these can compromise one’s skills and put a tradeswoman at even more risk of harm. The lack of security for women apprentices to feel both physically and psychologically safe is identified as a significant stressor and impacts their overall mental health and wellbeing (Canadian Apprenticeship Forum, 2020).