The Use of Mentoring to Promote Well-being for Female SMART Members

Not Applicable

Active, not recruiting

Conditions: Harassment, Sexual
Bullying, Workplace
Work-Related Condition
Work-related Injury
Mental Stress
Work Related Stress
Harassment, Non-Sexual

Brief Summary: Women are highly underrepresented in the construction skilled trades. In addition to facing the industry's well-known physical risks, women are subjected to discrimination, harassment, and skills under-utilization. As a result, tradeswomen have increased risk for injury, stress-related health effects, and high attrition rates from apprenticeship programs, thus perpetuating their minority status. Mentoring is a well-established technique for learning technical and personal navigation skills in new or challenging social environments. The investigators propose development and dissemination of a mentorship program through local unions of the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers (SMART), and evaluating its success in reducing women's injury and work stress, while improving retention.

Detailed Description: Journey-level workers will be trained on effective mentoring techniques, and matched to approximately 100 women apprentices within participating local unions. Mentees will be followed for two years within the mentorship program, with another 100 women apprentices in locals not receiving the mentorship training similarly followed as controls. The impact of participation in mentoring programs will be measured through apprentices' experience of stress, coping mechanisms, safety climate, and retention in the apprenticeship programs. Specifically, the investigators propose to:

Aim 1: Develop a mentorship training program for journey-level sheet metal workers to assist women apprentices in navigating the challenges faced by women in trades

Aim 2: Disseminate the training and assist locals in developing effective mentorship programs

Aim 3: Evaluate the effectiveness of the mentoring programs specified in Aims 1 and 2

Aim 4: Disseminate the best practices for supporting women apprentices in the skilled trades.

Recruitment & Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria

All mentors must be journey-level sheet metal workers that are members of the SMART (International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers) Union. All mentees and control apprentices must be apprentice-level sheet metal workers that are members of the SMART Union, and identify as woman.

Exclusion Criteria

No exclusions will be made on the basis of sex, race, ethnicity, age, disability or religion for mentors, mentees, and control apprentices. No exclusions will be made on the basis of gender for mentors. For mentees and control apprentices, those that do not identify as a woman will be excluded.

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Mentees	Mentoring program	This arm consists of apprentice-level, female-identifying construction workers who will receive active mentorship (the intervention) for two years from trained journey-level mentors.

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Stress	4 year period	Measures of feelings of stress among the female workers from validated questionnaire
Job satisfaction	4 year period	Measures of job satisfaction from validated questionnaire
Social support	4 year period	Measures of social support both in and out of work from validated questionnaire
Work-related risks	4 year period	Knowledge, awareness, and coping mechanisms for work-related risks from validated questionnaire

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Retention in the trades	4 year period	Measure of the number of women who remain in the trades

Locations (19): Sheet Metal Workers Local 85
🇺🇸
Atlanta, Georgia, United States
Columbus Sheet Metal Workers Apprenticeship
🇺🇸
Columbus, Ohio, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 19
🇺🇸
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States
Phoenix Area Local 359
🇺🇸
Phoenix, Arizona, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 105
🇺🇸
Glendora, California, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 104
🇺🇸
San Jose, California, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 17
🇺🇸
Dorchester, Massachusetts, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 9
🇺🇸
Denver, Colorado, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 73
🇺🇸
Hillside, Illinois, United States
Hawaii Sheet Metal Workers Local 293
🇺🇸
Honolulu, Hawaii, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 20
🇺🇸
Indianapolis, Indiana, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 63
🇺🇸
Springfield, Massachusetts, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 10
🇺🇸
Maplewood, Minnesota, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 28
🇺🇸
New York, New York, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 36
🇺🇸
Saint Louis, Missouri, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 16
🇺🇸
Portland, Oregon, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 67
🇺🇸
San Antonio, Texas, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local Union 66
🇺🇸
Everett, Washington, United States
Sheet Metal Workers Local 49
🇺🇸
Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States