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When Roberta Hunte, now a Portland State University assistant professor, became a career counselor at Oregon Tradeswomen Inc. in Portland several years ago, she noticed a lack of opportunities in the trades for African-American women. She wanted to know how those in the industry were able to enter and sustain successful careers.

“These were exciting jobs,” she said. “They were well-paying jobs. But I kept noticing that there weren’t many women of color on these jobs.”

Already on her path to a Ph.D. in peace and conflict studies through the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, Canada, Hunte decided to write her dissertation on African-American tradeswomen. She interviewed women from around the U.S. to learn about their experiences.

Now the basis of her work has been transformed into a stage production called “,” which will appear Feb. 1 in Portland. The staged reading, which is part of the August Wilson Red Door Project at the Portland Playhouse, brings to life the experiences of six women characters who find success and challenges in the industry.

The production spotlights recurring themes of sexual harassment, exclusion from opportunities and lack of institutional support for professional development, she said.

“I had thought someone from Atlanta – where there are a lot of black folks – would have a different experience than someone from California, but in reality, the experience is pretty similar regardless of where they are from,” she said. “It’s a very challenging field for women and it’s amplified for women of color.”

Hunte looked around the country for African-American women who had worked in the trades; 15 responded. Hunte, who grew up in both Atlanta and South Africa, met with each of them.

Later, Hunte worked with local dramatist Bonnie Ratner to create a stage version of what she had gathered in her dissertation. The project attempts to humanize women who are often invisible in the construction industry, said Ratner, executive director of the August Wilson Red Door Project, which is using the arts to address racial topics in Portland.

“When people think of construction workers, they rarely think about women and they almost never think about women of color,” Ratner said. “This is a beginning. It is inviting us to think more deeply about what inclusion really looks like.”

Among the characters in the stage production is one in her 80s who worked in the shipyards as a welder for more than four decades. She got into the trades during the World War II construction boom where women laborers were needed to build the nation’s military arsenal and other materials. The woman, who in her youth was told she would only become a maid, remained a welder after the war. She lived a middle class life and eventually sent her son to Harvard University, Hunte said.

Other characters include a woman in her 40s who is the victim of sexual harassment and a carpenter’s apprentice in her 20s who is relegated to stacking wood instead of learning the trade.

The lessons from the characters show the importance of a company’s approach to diversity in the success of African-American tradeswomen, Hunte said.

“If institutions are willing to make it a priority to have a diverse workforce, they will have a diverse workforce,” she said. “If not, then they won’t.”

While programs for minority-owned, women-owned and emerging small businesses have helped provide access for women and women of color into the construction industry, creating alliances within the industry is still a challenge, said Connie Ashbrook, executive director of Oregon Tradeswomen, a nonprofit that connects women with apprenticeship programs.

Oregon women comprise 8 percent of the state’s apprenticeship program participants, compared with about 3 percent nationally, Ashbrook said. That number is on the rise, she said.

However, African-American women face a “double whammy of bias” in the industry, she said. There are only about 10 African-American women out of 2,229 in the major apprenticeship programs locally.

One of the biggest challenges is that each apprenticeship program has its own application and training program, Ashbrook said.

“It really starts out with who you know – who can give you jobs, who is a role model and a mentor,” she said. “Part of what Oregon Tradeswomen is trying to do is showing that these careers are out there.”

Companies can do more to break the pattern of bias in the workplace by targeting their recruiting efforts to make sure their workforce reflects the community at large, Ashbrook said.

The company owner, supervisors and managers set the tone by creating a culture of respect, she said.

“That culture goes down the line to the lowest person in the work charts,” she said.

To learn more about the staged reading, visit .

Industry opportunities

The construction industry is expected to face a shortage of workers in the years to come, so many opportunities will exist for women and minorities to enter, said Bridget Quinn, workforce development coordinator for the NECA-IBEW Electrical Training Center in Portland. She said the best resource is the Oregon Apprenticeship website – .