Kimberly Rush has worked in the food industry for 23 years. She worked as a waiter in a restaurant and prepared food in a supermarket deli. One day, she decided she was tired of being on her feet all day, working weekends and holidays, and without paid vacation or other benefits.
Melissa Semper was on a similar boat, working as a Lyft driver. She was also raising two boys as a single mother and survivor of domestic violence.
Rush and Semper, both women of color, recently put those days behind them. They are successfully replacing low-paying, endless jobs with stable, high-paying jobs with regular hours, benefits, and opportunities for advancement in the technology and semiconductor industries. They are pursuing careers that were not held by women.
Rush, 48, of Phoenix, works for PacSci EMC, a company with a factory in Chandler that makes parts used in the aerospace and defense fields. After starting as an assembler, he was promoted to inspector and earned more than $22 an hour.
Semper, 42, of Tempe, is being trained through his union, UA Local 469, in a five-year apprenticeship program to work as a pipe fitter and welder in the semiconductor industry. She started at $21.90 an hour. After the raise, she now makes $23.74 an hour and has the potential to earn $60 an hour when she becomes a journeyman.
Mr. Rush and Mr. Semper did not make the transition from service-sector jobs to lucrative careers in the growing semiconductor and technology industries on their own. They received support from the Fresh Start Women’s Foundation. A Phoenix nonprofit helps underprivileged women become financially independent and self-sufficient.
Rush and Semper received career transition counseling, training, and on-the-job skills thanks to a two-year, $542,000 grant that Fresh Start received from the U.S. Department of Labor in 2022. This funding will support programs aimed at enabling women to participate in apprenticeships in trade and technology industry occupations that women traditionally do not perform.
Fresh Start serves about 4,000 women a year, most of them Latinas and other women of color, said Kim McWaters, the nonprofit’s president and CEO. It is said that About 80% are mothers, and 70% are single mothers, McWaters said.
“This investment provides transformative opportunities for our organization, the women we serve, and our communities,” McWaters said in August, when Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su visited Fresh Start and held a roundtable discussion.
Biden administration puts money into apprenticeship programs
Hsu was one of several Biden administration officials who recently visited Arizona, a key battleground state, to promote various programs and initiatives in the run-up to the Nov. 5 presidential election.
“Fresh Start really exemplifies what we are trying to build across the country when we talk about really building pathways to opportunity for everyone,” Sue said at Fresh Start. said during the meeting.
The meeting was attended by local leaders involved in developing apprenticeship programs, including East Valley Technical College.
“You’re really setting an example for what’s going to happen in other parts of this country,” Sue said. “What kind of investments are being made here, not just because of President Biden and Vice President Harris, but because of these (government) investments, private investments are coming in as well.”
The Biden administration has made expanding apprenticeship programs, which pay workers to learn on the job, a top priority, although it imposes a heavy cost on taxpayers. In July, the government announced $244 million in grants to 10 states and about 50 nonprofit organizations to develop apprenticeship programs. The apprenticeship aims to rebuild the middle class and provide better job opportunities for underrepresented people in growing industries such as semiconductors, advanced technology and clean energy sectors.
Under the leadership of the Biden administration, East Valley Technical College has been allocated a $6 million grant from the Department of Labor to work with employers to develop apprenticeship programs.
The Department of Labor also announced on Oct. 3 that Fresh Start will continue to help women access apprenticeships in non-traditional trades for another two years, according to Abdu Dar, the organization’s vice president of strategic partnerships. announced that it will receive a $707,000 grant.
Fresh Start also recently received a separate $470,000 grant to develop a new program to train 180 women over three years, specifically in the clean energy and semiconductor fields in Arizona. The state is becoming a global center for high-tech jobs, fueled in part by the development of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.’s large-scale factory north of Phoenix and the influx of other high-tech manufacturers.
Dahl said Fresh Start is currently building relationships with semiconductor manufacturers and clean energy companies to offer registered apprenticeships to women.
The new program will provide services to help women get back on their feet so they can enter and successfully complete an apprenticeship program, McWaters said. Services include health and mental health counseling, financial literacy, family stability, and education and career coaching, McWaters said.
The grant, which will help disadvantaged women prepare for apprenticeships in the clean energy and semiconductor industries, will be made through UnidosUS, a national Latinx civil rights advocacy organization, said Mauricio Garcia, UnidosUS senior vice president of programs. It was provided by the Ministry of Labor.
UnidosUS received $4 million from the federal Labor Department, which will be distributed to Fresh Start and two other city nonprofits, the Latin American Association of Atlanta and the Association House of Chicago, which are also UnidosUS affiliates. said Garcia.
“While the overall goal of these locations is to ensure that Latinos have access to careers and good jobs in emerging and important fields where they may be present, , there’s no such thing as a trajectory to finding a good job, a good career,” Garcia said.
Citing Department of Labor statistics, Garcia said Latinos are expected to account for 78% of net new workers from 2020 to 2030.
“We have the organization, expertise and skills to support these growth areas,” Garcia said.
Pipefitter apprentice: “I love every moment of this job”
During Secretary Su’s visit to Phoenix in August, Rush, Semper, and a third woman, Annalee Flores, spoke about how participating in the Fresh Start program had improved their lives. Ta.
Flores, 23, said she was recently divorced. She became pregnant at the age of 18, right after graduating from high school. My son is currently 5 years old and started kindergarten this year.
In addition to providing counseling support through her divorce, Fresh Start helped connect her with a welding apprenticeship.
However, she admitted that she initially joined the program with “not the right intentions”.
“My ex-husband is also a welder, so I wanted to build a better relationship with him,” Flores said. “But it didn’t work out.”
But things eventually got better for her. She works in a company as a welder and manufacturer and earns a good income.
“Now I’m growing up,” Flores said. “I’ve had a really good career.”
In an interview, Sempel said he was originally from Trinidad and Tobago. She moved from the Bronx, New York to Arizona in May 2020 with her two sons to start anew after her divorce. She also said she experienced mental health issues stemming from her National Guard deployment to Afghanistan in 2011 and 2012.
Semper said she moved to Arizona with the intention of becoming a yoga teacher, but ended up driving for Lyft to make money. Semper said she sought help from Fresh Start after her relationship with a man recently released from prison became abusive.
Through Fresh Start, Semper completed a seven-month tuition-free program to study welding at RSI, a trade school in Phoenix that offers welding, HVAC, refrigeration and electrical programs.
Semper said a Fresh Start counselor referred her to an interview with UA Local 469 after she struggled to find a job. She is currently in the first year of a five-year apprenticeship to become a journeyman pipefitter/welder.
The pipe fitting industry remains overwhelmingly male-dominated. Currently, only 10 percent of the 1,300 apprentices in the Local 469 program are women, said Training Director Mike Malloy. But women are reaping the benefits, he says. Two years ago, about 6.5% of trainees were women.
“There’s a misconception” that this is a deal for men, Malloy said.
“Not really,” he said. “It appeals to all genders.”
Semper spends a week studying in a classroom about once a month. The remaining three weeks are spent learning hands-on in the field.
“Right now, we’re learning the basics of pipe trading,” Semper said. “So how do you bend the pipe and how do you calculate what the offset is if the pipe is not straight but at a 45 degree or 90 degree angle? It teaches us a lot of mathematics.”
Sempel said her life is no longer stagnant. She learns something new every day and loves it.
“I’m very happy,” Semper said. “I’m loving every moment of this.”
Rush, a Minnesota native, is a member of the Red Lake Band of Chippewa. She has lived in Arizona since 2001. Before undergoing chemotherapy for chronic myeloid leukemia, he worked primarily in restaurants, but during the COVID-19 pandemic he started working at a supermarket deli to reduce contact with the public. I started working in the back room.
Then, one day in February 2023, Rush decided she was ready to do something different.
She went home, started browsing the Internet, and discovered a Fresh Start program called Career Jumpstart, which helps women start careers in technology, trades, and other high-wage, high-growth industries.
That March, Ms. Rush attended a Fresh Start event that featured a panel of women sharing their experiences working in non-traditional occupations.
That led to a two-week bootcamp at Mesa Community College, where she learned how to become a cable wiring harness assembler.
After earning her certification, Rush received further help from Fresh Start, learning how to properly fill out job applications, write a resume, and practice interviews in front of panels in person and on Zoom.
“I got a lot of great feedback. How to answer questions, how to prepare,” Rush said.
Rush then attended a Fresh Start job fair and received interviews and offers from two companies, including PacSci EMC. She took the job at PacSci because it paid better and offered better benefits.
On August 13th, Rush completed his first year at PacSci.
In addition to a higher salary, she also receives medical and dental insurance, paid time off, and profit sharing. Also, unlike in the restaurant industry, she no longer has to work weekends or holidays. In fact, she works four 10-hour days, Monday through Thursday. Therefore, she has Friday, Saturday, and Sunday off.
Rush said her life has changed “dramatically. I now spend more time with friends and family on weekends and holidays.”
And financially, “it’s helping us figure out the next step toward retirement.”
Contact the reporter at daniel.gonzalez@arizonarepublic.com.
