Supporting Women Truck Drivers
90-Day Trucking Action Plan - On April 4, Women’s Bureau (WB) Director Wendy Chun-Hoon, along with Program Analyst Katrin Schulz, attended a White House event highlighting the administration’s 90 Day Trucking Action Plan, which is part of ongoing work to address supply chain priorities. The Department of Labor’s role in these efforts is to ensure trucking jobs are good jobs and safe jobs. To that end, together with the Veterans' Employment and Training Service (VETS), the Wage and Hour Division (WHD), the Employment and Training Administration (ETA) and the Office of the Secretary (OSEC), the WB has been building DOL’s Driving Good Jobs Initiative, our centerpiece within the 90 Day Trucking Action Plan.
Day of Action - On April 28, the WB in partnership with women truck drivers, sexual assault survivors, employers, advocacy groups, Members of Congress, the White House, the Department of Transportation’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission organized a Day of Action to Raise Awareness and Advocate for the Prevention of Sexual Assault & Sexual Harassment in Trucking. The Day of Action secured commitments from industry employers and associations to combat sexual assault and violence in the industry. The WB culminated the Day of Action with a roundtable discussion about strategies to ensure drivers have safe and inclusive work environments, to shift cultural norms and to ensure trauma-informed, survivor-centered responses to reports of violence and harassment that occur both in and outside of the truck.
- Find more information about promoting safety in trucking
- Check out this ride along video filmed with long haul truck driver Brita Nowak and Wendy Chun Hoon, Nikkilia Lu and Katrin Schulz of the WB
- Read the blog: “Day of Action to Promote Safety and Prevent Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment in the Trucking Industry”
- Read the blog: “Driving Change: Ensuring a Safe Work Environment in the Trucking Industry”
- Read the press release
Other Recent Events
Flipping the Script: Racial and Gender Equity in a Recovering Economy
The WB closed out Women’s History Month with a panel of experts who explored whether pandemic-related outcomes are likely to perpetuate longstanding patterns of gender or racial inequality or whether this is a "flip the script" moment with the potential for the recovery to usher in an era of greater equity and equality for Black women workers and indeed, all women workers.
Equity in Focus: Investing in Childcare Careers
The WB, in partnership with Cornell’s Worker Institute, hosted a second conversation in the Equity in Focus webinar series. Equity in Focus: Investing in Childcare Careers explored the challenges of the childcare industry and the impact of COVID-19 on this industry and its workers. The webinar also highlighted local examples across the US that are improving access to childcare while also raising wages for childcare workers.
HBCU Educational Forum: Federal Opportunities and Resources
On April 28, the WB in collaboration with the White House Initiative on Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) hosted a webinar for HBCU students, faculty members and parents to provide information on resources from federal agencies and opportunities for employment within the government. Representatives of the WB, the Wage and Hour Division, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and other agencies were in attendance. In addition to employment opportunities, information about apprenticeships, veterans services, and benefits programs were discussed.
The Atlantic’s “The Progress Report: Advancing Equity in America”
WB Director Wendy Chun-Hoon participated in The Atlantic’s “The Progress Report: Advancing Equity in America” virtual event, during which she discussed the future of women in the workforce.
She noted the importance of making sure that “we’re able to choose our careers based on our interests and not based on our gender, and really addressing this issue about occupational segregation, supporting women to get into the jobs that are going to be created to rebuild the infrastructure of our country.”
“Entering into a workplace where you are by far the minority is going to take a lot of attention to make sure that that workplace is really free from harassment and discrimination and bullying.”
North American Building Trades Unions Legislative Summit
WB Director Wendy Chun-Hoon co-moderated a powerful session at the NABTU legislative summit. The session featured tradeswomen from across the skilled trades talking about strategies for diversifying unions and careers in the trades.
Hear Our Voices
On April 25, WB Director Wendy Chun-Hoon spoke on the panel, Hear Our Voices, hosted by the Center for Asian Pacific Women, Organization for Chinese Americans, and Center for Pan Asian Community Services. The 3-part series is focused on disrupting xenophobia and promoting visibility of the diverse lived experiences among the AANHPI community, in reflection of the anniversary of the Atlanta spa shootings and in lead up to AANHPI heritage month in May.
The Economy She Deserves: Building an Agenda for a Women-Centered Recovery
WB Director Wendy Chun-Hoon participated in “The Economy She Deserves: Building an Agenda for a Women-Centered Recovery,” discussing the impacts of the pandemic on women workers and how to build an economy that works for women. She talked about combatting occupational segregation through increased access to apprenticeships and training, and increasing access to paid family medical leave.
Solutions for the Justice Involved Women Program
In honor of Second Chance Month, the WB has been hosting a webinar series for DOL employees and members of the public.
- Part 1 on April 20th, featured justice involved women, experts in the area of female incarceration and advocates speaking about the challenges and barriers justice involved women face.
- Part 2 on April 27th, was solution oriented. DOL agencies and grantees shared the resources and supports they are providing to help justice involved women advance in the workplace and external organizations shared their thoughts on the components necessary to run a successful reentry program.
- Part 3 on May 4th will further explore how adverse childhood experiences (ACES) and subsequent trauma substantially increases the likelihood of women to experience incarceration or entanglement with the criminal legal system.
DOL Equity Action Plan
DOL released its Equity Action Plan summarizing the early actions we have taken to support marginalized, vulnerable and underserved communities, and the steps we're continuing to take to advance equity across the department. Themes in the plan include protecting workers’ wage and hour rights, improving timely access to unemployment insurance benefits, improving language access in DOL programs and services, reducing barriers to workforce training for underserved communities, and developing government apprenticeships.
Recognizing Black Maternal Health Week
During Black Maternal Health Week, the White House released a fact sheet describing actions in response to Vice President Harris’s call to action on maternal health. Vice President Harris convened a meeting with Cabinet Secretaries and agency leaders to discuss the Administration’s whole-of-government approach to addressing maternal mortality and morbidity. The Vice President convened leaders across the federal government – including agencies that may not have historically taken a leading role addressing the maternal health crisis.
Join our Team!
The WB is hiring a Communications Specialist. The announcement closes on May 9.
A Look Ahead
May 4, 12:00-1:30 pm ET | Trauma Informed Care for Justice Involved Women
May 11, 3:00-4:30 pm ET | Equity in the Workplace: What Does Equity Look Like for Military Spouses
May 12, 9:00-10:00 pm ET | Know Your Rights: FMLA and Nursing Mothers
- Register for the event
May 17, 11:30 am-1:30 pm ET | Migrant Women in the Workplace: Mental Health Roundtable
May 18, 3:00-4:30 pm ET | Equity in the Workplace: Pregnancy and Parenting Workers
May 25 (tentative date) | Equity in the Workplace: Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander Women
- Registration link to come
We Want to Hear from You!
"Occupational segregation" is the gendered division of men and women into different types of jobs. It leads to women being overrepresented in certain jobs, which are generally valued and compensated less than male-dominated jobs.
We've heard from many working women about their experiences with gendered job expectations, the challenges they face at work, the supports that help them thrive, and the policy changes that would help them succeed.
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