Mentorship needed to attract more women to trades
August 7, 2022
Rosane Parent was just 18 years old when she first jumped behind the wheel of a transport truck as a driver for her family’s Kapuskasing trucking company.
Pulled up at a truck stop while en route to a delivery one day, she was awaiting some fellow drivers to join her for lunch when she was accosted by a man who made it clear he didn’t think she was cut out for the job.
First he suggested the truck belonged to her husband or boyfriend; then he accused her of stealing it.
Parent was left reeling when the man launched into an angry tirade denouncing women who thought they were “better” than men and stealing their jobs.
“I’m sitting there as a young kid going, ‘Whoa’. This is the first time I really felt that I was (singled out as) a woman,” Parent recalled.
“How do I defend myself, and why should I? And all of these questions are going a mile a minute while you’re trying to figure out, am I safe? Am I physically safe? Because he seems upset.”
The moment passed, and Parent was able to leave the situation safely, but it wasn’t the last time she would come up against resistance to the idea of women working in industries that had traditionally employed only men.
Since those early years, Parent has transitioned to a different career path, currently serving as project management officer with Maurice Welding, a welding and fabrication shop with locations in Kapuskasing and Hearst.
She’s certified as a welding supervisor by the Canadian Welding Bureau (CWB) and as a coating inspector by the National Association of Corrosion Engineers (currently the Association for Materials Protection and Performance).
Source: Timmins Today
