Trading on their skills: More women are choosing to work in the trades for better pay and benefits

Taylor Diaz of Marengo was recently up in a ceiling running piping to encase electric wiring in a newly constructed commercial building in Huntley.

The 28-year-old married mother of two young children works for Lauderdale Electric in East Dundee. She is a journeyman wireman with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local 117 and – despite traditional terms like “brotherhood” and ”journeyman” – she is among a growing number of women entering the trades in recent years.

“Women are seeing the trades, especially union trades, as a good, viable option,” Josh Sajtar of Sleepy Hollow said. Sajtar is a member of the union’s executive board and training director in charge of apprenticeships. “They have the opportunity to get paid the same as their male counterparts when performing the same work.”

According to Institute for Women’s Policy Research, in 2023, “the number of women working in the trades reached the highest level ever, with 363,651 working in construction and extraction occupations. In the five years since 2018, the number of tradeswomen increased by more than 80,000, a growth of 28.3 percent. Construction careers are attracting an increasing number of women.”

When Diaz was about 23 and working in Stryker factory in Cary, she was asked by a union electrician if she wanted to be an apprentice and learn how to do electrical work.

She already had an associate degree from Rock Valley College in Rockford, where she said she attended primarily to play softball. But she didn’t really know what she wanted to do for a career. She thought she wanted to go to McHenry County College and become a paramedic, but that didn’t pan out. What she did know was that she wanted to work with her hands. So when the opportunity came to be an apprentice, she took it.

“It’s been nothing but a positive experience for me,” she said. “You learn every single day.”

Diaz spent five years training on various job sites, receiving positive feedback and support from her male counterparts. She worked, earned an income and had health benefits and a pension from Day 1. She attended night classes twice a week.

Additionally, her training and schooling are free, paid for by the union, Sajtar said. Working in the trades is an opportunity to train to make a good living “without incurring student loans and debt,” he said.

The electricians union offers two apprenticeship programs, Inside wireman for electricians and telecommunications installer technician for low voltage communications techs, Sajtar said. The inside wireman program is the five-year apprenticeship that Diaz was in.

Sajtar said starting pay for an apprentice in inside wireman program is $22.40 an hour on the check, but about $37 with pension, health care, and other benefits figured in. After the apprenticeship, a journeyman makes about $56, or about $100 with benefits, Sajtar said. Wages for an apprentice in the three-year telecommunications installer technician program start at about $21 an hour, or $34.45 with pension and benefits, with post-apprenticeship pay about $46 and close to $82 with benefits. There are six pay rates through each apprenticeship, with raises coming based on hours worked and coursework completed, Sajtar said.

Other trades provide roughly the same pay scale, according to the Construction Industry Service Corporation website.

Sajtar, who has three children, said he encourages each of them to enter the trades, but especially his daughter. Having worked in the field since 1997, Sajtar said he’s seen people switch to careers in the trades after failing to find well-paying white-collar jobs with pensions and benefits, despite having college degrees. In recent years, this includes more women.

“I am seeing more and more interest. It is more a matter of people being aware of the opportunity and not afraid to take that leap,” he said. “For females, they might see different pressures; it is a male-dominated industry. If anything, they have to perform better because they are scrutinized more.”

Still, he encourages women who are interested to consider the trades.

“If they enjoy working with their hands, they are as well-suited to do it as any guy,” he said. “There is a place for women in any of the trades if they would have the interest and desire to be a part of that.”

Jena Sarvis, 40, of Crystal Lake, is a journeyman electrician, an affiliate of IBEW 117 and officer in the union who sits on the examining board. She works at Carey Electrical Contractors in McHenry where she began as an installer in 2007. She now is project manager supervising 20 to 50 other electricians. But when she graduated from high school, she had “no idea” what she wanted to do.

“I knew nothing about construction,” she said. She attended college to become a surgical technician. But, as she was finishing her clinical work, she “realized I didn’t like hospitals.”

A friend’s father who was an electrician and member of Local 117 asked if she wanted to help with a few jobs and he would pay her cash. She accepted the offer and was glad she did.

“I immediately fell in love,” Sarvis said. “I loved everything about it.”

She applied for a five-year apprenticeship and after three years, she was accepted. She received paid on-the-job training and attended free night classes. Sarvis was one of “the pioneers.”

“There were no women in my local at that time, but for one several years before ... there was no discussion of women” or any women on job sites, she said.

“I liked the fact I was able to work with my hands,” Sarvis said. “It gave me a sense of pride knowing I was the only woman at the time. I loved that I could do it as well or better than the men. I earned respect from them.”

Sarvis worked as a journeyman wireman in the field for 11 years. She bent pipe, pulled wire and installed panel boards and fixtures. She has worked in hospitals, big-box buildings, residences, multi-family units, apartments and single-family homes. She said installing wiring and lighting up her first house “was like giving birth.”

Sarvis said she had her first child in her first year of apprenticeship and later had a set of twins. She was nervous at first to tell her company she was pregnant, fearing she would be let go. A pregnant woman presents different liabilities in a predominantly male industry, she acknowledged. But, her company supported her and was “incredibly accommodating.”

Tom McGee, of Hampshire, is the dean of manufacturing and advanced technology at MCC. He said the uptick in men and women getting into the trades led to construction of the new Foglia Center that opened at MCC’s main campus in Crystal Lake this year.

The nearly $30 million center offers nine associate degrees and 39 certificates at costs much less than a four-year college, McGee said. In-district costs for a two-year degree are $9,300 and $21,000 for out of district.

“But you can get a certificate as quickly as one semester and get a job,” McGee said.

In planning for the 45,000-square-feet center, McGee said MCC sat down with 100 local companies to learn what they were most in need of. The response? More skilled trades workers. There has been a decline in decades past of those going into the trades, and companies need to fill the positions of the retiring workforce, creating the current demand for skilled workers, McGee said.

Programs offered include Architectural and Engineering Design Technology; Automation, Robotics and Mechatronics; Construction Management; Engineering Technology; Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning; Industrial Maintenance; Industrial Management and Technology; Precision Machining; and Welding and Fabrication.

The programs are “employer-driven curriculum” that provide hands-on experience, MCC Precision Machining instructor Tom Pleuger said in a recent news story.

Those applying for the programs are a mix of people. Some start while still in high school or after graduation. While others are older, returning students, McGee said.

“There is no rhyme or reason to it, people in different walks of life just starting out or looking for a new career, due to a change in their current job or dissatisfaction in current job,” McGee said.

The COVID-19 pandemic also played a role in the shift.

“Through COVID, people had their eyes opened to the cost of a four-year degree verses a potential income. ... The future, I think we are going to see a far more diversified workforce,” McGee said.

Sarvis participates in women’s groups including the North American Women in Construction “to spread the word to other women who may not know, they are able to work in construction.”

In an industry where, not so long ago, there were no women, there are now women’s networks, she said.

She talks to women and lets them know that working in the trades “is an opportunity to empower ourselves now and an opportunity to empower women of the future. We are capable of doing all things men can do ... and exceptionally well.”