Ways to get and keep women in skilled trades

With her helmet and tool belt tied around her waist, Canadore College Level 3 apprentice carpentry student Sarah Lachapelle is breaking down barriers, both literally and figuratively, as officials gathered in North Bay to discuss ideas to get more women into the skilled trades.

Roundtable on ideas to get women in skilled trades held at the North Bay Chamber of Commerce. Jan. 19/24 (Eric Taschner/CTV Northern Ontario)

"Carpentry was my final choice and I love it and I’ve been loving it so far,” she said.

"It's definitely something I want to pursue."

She’s the only female student in her class.

She said she wanted to study carpentry so she could one day build her own house.

"Last year was a little different, we had three girls,” Lachapelle said.

"But in the workforce, as well, I’m also the only woman."

Statistics Canada finds that across the country, only about five per cent of skilled trade workers are women.

Canadore’s carpentry apprentices professor Jill Rydall has been in the skilled trades for more than 40 years.

She said she would like to see more younger women like Lachapelle get their foot in the door.

"Let me tell you, women are super talented when it comes to using any of the equipment, and they're super precise," Rydall said.

"They're just gifted and there are a lot of viable careers."

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Sarah Lachapelle, a Canadore College Level 3 apprentice carpentry student. Jan. 19/24 (Eric Taschner/CTV Northern Ontario)

The North Bay professor sat in on a roundtable discussion with other female entrepreneurs and skilled workers in the North Bay and District Chamber of Commerce building Friday morning.

It was led by Charmaine Williams, Ontario’s associate minister of women's social and economic opportunity, and Vic Fedeli, the Nipissing MPP and Ontario’s minister of economic development, job creation and trade.

Charmaine Williams, Ontario’s associate minister of women's social and economic opportunity in North Bay for roundtable discussion to brainstorm ideas on how to get more women into skilled trades. Jan. 19/24 (Eric Taschner/CTV Northern Ontario)

The roundtable was an opportunity to brainstorm ideas to try and find ways to get more women into the trades.

"A lot of employers are saying, 'when we have women on the job site, it's a better environment,'" Williams told reporters after the discussion.

"We’ve seen a 30 per cent increase of women in female apprenticeship."

The biggest barrier, Williams said, is discrimination, whether it’s obvious or not. Shockingly, about half of the women who enter the trades choose to leave after four years.

"It’s sometimes just the work environment itself, the culture, the job sites in the trades,” she said.

"Whenever you get women together to have conversations of the barriers that we are facing to our success, solutions always come out of them."

The next discussion is to find ways to keep them in the sector.

North Bay and District Chamber of Commerce president Donna Backer was sitting in on the roundtable discussion as well.

She said one positive way to retain and recruit women into the skilled trades is to ensure job sites have a women’s washroom or change room readily available.

"The education is there … We need to just find out whether or not there is an opportunity for the government to help out our business community," she said.

"It is an education at all levels. Men need to realize that women can do the job just as well as you."

Backer also touched on the impact women have in the workplace, especially one that can be seen as 'male dominant.'

“There is a cleaner work environment, it is a calmer work environment and businesses are seeing an increase in productivity when women are there,” she said.

"Because the men are seeing the women working a little differently and they want to be working exactly the same way."

Williams said these kinds of discussions are meant to create a brighter future for the next generation of hard-working women in the skilled trades.

"I always say, 'If you can see me, you can be me' and we need to tell the story of what the opportunities are,” she said.

"We have invested around $30 million to see women have opportunities and entrepreneurship and getting women into sectors where we are underrepresented."

Lachapelle acknowledges that there are going to be stigmas and barriers along the way, but said she is ready to tackle them head-on.

"It’s all a mental game," she said.

"There are lots of barriers, but I’m not letting them stop me."