By Caroline Weier
The buzz of circular saws blends with pop music as smiling students cut wood and banter across the workbenches of Roseville Area High School’s woodshop.
In a space once dominated by boys, the school’s Woodworking I course for female-identifying students has transformed the shop into a safe, empowering place to explore the trades. Held in a large shop equipped with industry-grade tools and grounded in hands-on learning, the class offers a rare opportunity for female-identifying students to build both technical skills and confidence in a field where their representation remains low.
Despite making up roughly half of all individuals currently employed in the U.S. labor force, women represent less than 5% of the skilled trades workforce in the U.S., according to the U.S. Department of Labor.
Often rooted in workplace discrimination, harassment and unequal treatment in training and advancement, women’s underrepresentation in the trades stems from systemic barriers that discourage entry and make retention difficult, according to a 2023 study conducted by the U.S. Department of Labor.
By creating a dedicated space for female-identifying students to learn problem-solving, safety and employability skills without fear of judgment, Roseville’s Woodworking I course addresses structural obstacles long before students enter the workforce, according to Jeff Davies, the course’s long-time instructor.
“Anytime you look into a typical workshop class, it’s almost all boys or males,” Davies said. “For other female students to walk by the room and look in and see a classroom full of female students, it’s really eye-opening… And when they see that, that could definitely change their perspective.”
Offered since the early 2000s, the class is one of several Career and Technical Education (CTE) courses at Roseville Area High School are designed to prepare students for both college and in-demand careers. It runs five hours a week for 12 weeks and is capped at 28 students, with some years offering two sections due to high demand.
The 4,000-square-foot facility functions as a full-production woodshop with cabinet-making capabilities, a wide range of woodworking tools and a fenced-in outdoor yard where students mill and process their own lumber.
While the class focuses on traditional woodshop skills through four main projects — a sign, pen, plate and charcuterie board — Davies says the course goes far beyond that.
“I tell the students on the first day, this is not your grandfather’s workshop,” Davies said. “You don’t build birdhouses, and we read and we write every day in the wood shops.”
Davies, who has taught the course for 16 years, believes in reinforcing college readiness, and the skills being taught and used in core classes are important and applicable to trade courses. Each class, students utilize an interactive notebook where they write a table of contents, take notes on the procedures they do and create an organized system to access information efficiently.
The class includes leadership opportunities and guest visits from women engineers and trades professionals, helping students envision a future in the field, with some choosing to pursue trades careers after graduation.
Elliette Wilson, a junior at Roseville Area High School, took the course as a sophomore, a decision that solidified her interest in a future career in construction management.
“Seeing how few females were in [trade] courses, and even in woodworking, I think that influenced me to want to be one of the few females in the industry,” Wilson said.
The smaller, female-identifying woodworking class felt more welcoming and less intimidating than her other shop classes, where she often felt judged by male peers, she recalls. The course helped her feel confident exploring the trades, ultimately influencing her decision to attend a Women in Construction Management program at Colorado State University this summer.
In addition to Woodworking I, the school offers female-identifying sections in small engines and auto mechanics.
Ken Sopcinski, who has taught auto mechanics at Roseville High School for 26 years, said the decision to create separate sections came after years of watching female students avoid trade courses.
“The number one reason girls don’t take shop classes is because of boys,” Sopcinski said. “You look at my roster, and it looks like it’s straight out of 1955.”
A female-identifying auto mechanics section has been available for over 15 years, but has only run once, until now. Due to rising student interest, Roseville plans to run the course again next school year, with the goal of giving students the confidence and background they need to enter the field without the intimidation that often comes with being the only girl in the room.
“The gender makeup of the class shouldn’t be a deciding factor in whether or not they take the class, and we’ve taken a big step toward eliminating that,” Sopcinski said.
While advanced courses like Woods 2 through 5 and upper-level auto mechanics do not offer female-identifying sections, instructors say students who begin in gender-specific classes often gain the confidence, skills and foundational knowledge to succeed in the mixed-gender environment.
As demand for skilled labor grows, CTE programs like Roseville’s are becoming more essential, Davies says. He believes the district stands out not just for its commitment to both college and career readiness, but for the strength of its facilities and hands-on training.
“We’re different … and we’re better. Our programs are better,” Davies said. “We train kids for college, but we also train them for careers like nobody else does around us.”
Photo caption: Elliette Wilson, a junior at Roseville Area High School, uses a miter saw, a tool used to make precise angled cuts in wood, to saw a wood plank in the school’s woodshop after school on May 28. (Caroline Weier/Roseville Reporter)
