Women break barriers in the trades
by Gail Allyn Short
“ValleyBuild changed my life. My life is completely different because they gave me an opportunity.”
Alexis Rowberry, ValleyBuild participant & electrical apprentice with IBEW Local Union 100
After surviving homelessness and struggling to make ends meet by working minimum-wage positions, Alexis Rowberry of Clovis decided it was time to find a higher-paying job to better support herself and her two young children.
Today, Rowberry is starting her fifth and final year as an apprentice and aims to become a foreman with IBEW Local Union 100. Rowberry says ValleyBuild’s free construction training “changed my life. My life is completely different because they gave me an opportunity.”
ValleyBuild is working to attract more women, like Rowberry, to the trades. She first learned about ValleyBuild through an ad posted at a California Department of Social Services office.
“I figured, ‘It couldn’t be too hard, and construction is going to pay me right now. I don’t have to wait and get a degree or anything. I can just go work and do construction now and get paid and take care of my kids,’” Rowberry recalls. So, she took the initiative and applied.
ValleyBuild is sponsored by the Fresno Regional Workforce Development Board in partnership with participating local building trade unions and other organizations across 14 counties. The program introduces students to various construction trades such as electrical, plumbing, ironworks, cement masonry and pipefitting and prepares them to apply for paid apprenticeships with the trade unions.
During her time in training, Rowberry and her classmates spent every weekday from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. visiting different trade unions, learning what to expect from each profession and completing hands-on projects at union halls – from building a brick wall to making metal toolboxes and connecting lightbulbs to switches – to help them decide which apprenticeships to apply for after graduation.
“I already knew I wanted to be an electrician from day one. That was my goal,” Rowberry says.
The class also earned certifications in health and safety procedures such as CPR/first aid, and forklift and scissor lift safety training.
Another ValleyBuild recruit, Maribel Andres of Fresno, says she had been working at an Amazon warehouse and was considering becoming an EMT before joining the program in 2022. She was initially uncertain which career path might make more sense for her. However, after reviewing the full benefits package associated with a career in construction, which includes a pension, the choice was clear. Andres says, “…it was an easy decision to make.”
“ValleyBuild gave us all the resources that we needed and set us up for success…They provided us with classes to study and freshen up on our math. We also had mock interviews to help us prep for interviews afterwards,” she says.
Today, Andres is a plumbing apprentice at Plumbers, Pipefitters, HVACR Technicians Local 246.
Rowberry and Andres say, however, they each were just one of only two women in their respective classes.
Robert Topete, director of training for the Fresno Area Plumbers, Pipefitters, and HVACR Technicians Joint Apprentice and Journeyman Training Center, says that in the past, it was uncommon to see women in the trades.
“But ValleyBuild has been pushing heavily to be diversified and to bring women into the trades,” he says. To do that, ValleyBuild has launched ValleyBuild NOW (Non-traditional Occupations for Women) which organizes all-women classes. “The all-women cohorts have really helped us because now instead of seeing two or three women in one class, now we’re seeing a class of 20. So that really boosts the numbers,” Topete says.
Last June in Clovis, 15 women graduated from the second ValleyBuild NOW class. Joe Estrada, outreach coordinator at the Fresno Area Electrical Training Center, shares, “We’ve been really pushing to help women understand and to see that although it’s a male-dominated industry, there’s absolutely no reason why it has to remain that way.”
Meanwhile, although most students in Rowberry’s class have been men, she has, nonetheless, felt supported by all of her instructors. “Anytime I had questions or needed something, they gave me what I needed to get through the program,” she says. “I have so much independence with my personal life because I don’t need help taking care of my kids. I don’t have to have financial help. I don’t have to ask my mom or get money from the State. It’s an amazing feeling.”
For more information about ValleyBuild’s programs, visit them online at valleybuild.net or call 855-805-7245.
