Building a Stronger Path for Indigenous Women in Construction

For Jessenia Rivera, creating more opportunities for Native American and Indigenous women in the building trades and construction industry is about far more than encouraging women to enter the industry. It is about building pathways that help Native women find work, develop careers, strengthen their communities and, ultimately, create a life-long career from which they may eventually retire.

Jessenia knows these challenges firsthand and is helping lead the way. A stationary engineer with the International Union of Operating Engineers and an active NAWIC member, she serves as one of four co-leads for NAWIC’s newly formed Indigenous Industry Council (IIC); alongside Nichole Foster, Doris Menore, and Regina Funmaker. She and Nichole also co-founded International Native Women in Trades to recruit and retain Native women across the building trades and construction industry.

From left to right: Kelly Aust, Jodi Wiemerslage, Jessenia Rivers, and Catherine Schoenenberger

“We created International Native Women in Trades to be an organization that not only facilitates recruiting, but also works on retaining Native women in the building trades and construction industry,” Jessenia explains, “We want to help grow a job into a career, making it to retirement.”

That long-term perspective is important. Getting women through the door is only the beginning. Jessenia adds that mentorship, community connections, and networking with women who have already built careers in the trades can be the difference between simply landing a job and developing a sustainable career.

NAWIC’s Indigenous Industry Council is new, officially approved in June 2026, but its approach reflects an important distinction: instead of developing an Indigenous initiative and then inviting Native women to participate, NAWIC saw members were already doing the work, so they asked them to lead it the initiative.

“NAWIC leaders didn’t want to appropriate or take over,” Jessenia notes with appreciation. “NAWIC wants Native leadership to stay with the women that are already leading the work and have the community trust.”

For Jessenia, that is what meaningful inclusion looks like. “If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu,” she explains. “Indigenous communities see projects developed on or near their land, but they are largely excluded from the jobs, which mean they are also excluded from the training and economic opportunities those projects create.”

Jessenia wants to change that model. “We have plenty of Native woman who want to work,” she says. “Yet construction companies usually bring workers in from around the country rather than recruiting or training people from the surrounding Native communities.”

One of the greatest challenges Indigenous women face in construction is also one of the most basic: getting access to the job in the first place.

“For women in the building trades and construction industry, the first challenge is actually getting a job,” she points out. “For Native women specifically, there have been too few organized pathways connecting women with training, contractors, unions and projects.”

She also challenges the assumption that construction simply lacks people willing to work. “I don’t think there’s necessarily a labor shortage,” Jessenia says. “But we do have a shortage of skilled, trained workers.”

That difference matters. International Native Women in Trades is working with women who want careers but do not always have access to the training and networks required to enter them.

“There’s a whole resource of untapped people who are looking for jobs, who are looking for training, who are looking for opportunities to be able to go home and support their families,” she says.

The IIC is working to help NAWIC members, chapters, and construction companies understand how to build those connections respectfully. “It definitely starts with awareness,” Jessenia notes.

Since NAWIC’s conference, Jessenia says contractors, owners and construction companies have already approached the IIC with questions about how they can better engage with Native workers and communities.

“Our job is not to catch being a bad actor,” she says. “When we talk to industry leaders, we understand that not all misinformation comes from willful ignorance. Instead, we talk about how they just happen to not know things affecting Native American and Indigenous communities and the history of this country, and we are here to help bridge that knowledge gap.”

With this in mind, the IIC is developing guidelines to help contractors understand how to engage tribal nations and tribal communities when working on or near Native land. NAWIC hopes the IIC resource can help companies start mutually beneficial relationships, build trust among people with different backgrounds, and eventually establish pipelines that consistently drive more Native women into construction careers.

For individual NAWIC members wanting to increase opportunities for Native women, the IIC recommends beginning close to home.

“The first step should be figuring out whose land you currently occupy,” Rivera says. From there, members can learn more about the tribal nations and Indigenous communities with ancestral and present-day connections to their area, identify Native community organizations, and begin building relationships.

But Rivera emphasizes that land acknowledgement alone is not enough. “It should not be performative,” she says. “We should talk about what land acknowledgements are and actually build a path forward together.”

That means moving beyond recognition toward real relationships, conversations, and opportunities. Members of the IIC are available to help NAWIC chapters make those connections and better understand how to engage with tribal nations and Indigenous communities. They are even willing to travel around the country to help groups develop programs and partnerships in ways that are respectful, collaborative, and rooted in the needs of the communities themselves.

The Indigenous Industry Council (IIC) land acknowledgment at the 2026 NAWIC Annual Conference in Reno, NV.

Perhaps one of the council’s most powerful tools is also one of the simplest: creating a place for women to talk honestly about their experiences. She remembers sharing her own story with an audience and being surprised when people began crying. “I thought they knew my story. But half the room was weeping, and I was like, ‘Why are these people so emotional?’ My experiences are normal for Native women, but I sometimes forget how shocking our stories can be.”

That reaction helped reinforce why the stories need to be heard. “The challenges of Native women often serve as a wakeup call. When you hear about our issues and challenges, and realize this is a wide-spread problem, that is the time to start talking about how to develop solutions.”

Through the Indigenous Industry Council, NAWIC is creating space for those conversations while helping turn awareness into opportunity.

For Jessenia, success will ultimately mean Native women are no longer viewed as an overlooked labor pool or invited onto projects only when companies happen to be working near tribal communities. It means they are recognized as skilled tradeswomen, leaders and long-term members of the construction industry. And it starts by making sure they have a seat at the table.