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_{Despite making up 47 percent of the workforce in the U.S., women constitute less than 5 percent of workers in skilled construction trades. Credit: Sophie Park for The Hechinger Report}

More women are landing construction jobs. Trump’s war on DEI could change that

Despite making up 47 percent of the workforce in the U.S., women constitute less than 5 percent of workers in skilled construction trades — a cluster of careers that typically offer high pay without requiring a college degree. The few women who land apprenticeships in a skilled trade often face bullying, harassment and low-level work opportunities. In recent years, nonprofit groups offering “preapprenticeships” and other programs designed to improve female representation in the trades have made some progress in changing the culture of construction worksites and improving access for women, nearly doubling the share of women in skilled trades from less than 3 percent to about 5 percent in the past decade. Now, advocates say those efforts are under threat from the Trump administration’s attacks on diversity, equity and inclusion.

A day after his inauguration in January, President Donald Trump revoked several decades-old executive orders designed to diversify the workforce, in an attempt to root out what he called “immoral race- and sex-based preferences under the guise of so-called diversity, equity, and inclusion.” Among them was Executive Order 11246. Issued in 1965 by President Lyndon B. Johnson, the order required federal contractors to provide equal employment opportunity without discriminating by race.

In 1978, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance issued a goal that took the order a step further: Contractors had to make a good faith effort to hire women to fill at least 6.9 percent of their positions in construction. That figure, which hasn’t been updated in 45 years, was based on the share of women in the workforce in the 1970s.

A school district singled out by Trump says it teaches ‘whole truth history’

After the deadly 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia’s Albemarle County school system set out to combat racism by teaching about discrimination, resistance and resilience.

Losing faith: Rural, religious campuses are among the most endangered

Rural students often have few options other than religious institutions fighting to survive.

📣 Listen up

Episode 6 of season 4 of College Uncovered, a podcast from The Hechinger Report and GBH News, is out now. 

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