1 min read

Season 5, Episode 162

How the support and encouragement of a union change a member’s life

MACRC

 

Guest Name:


Cindy Brooks

Guest Website:


Mid-America Carpenters Regional Council 

Guest Social Media:


Facebook

Twitter

YouTube

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Supportive Documents:


Cindy Brooks, a fourth-year apprentice with the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America Local Union 237 in Peoria, Ill., joined the America’s Work Force Union Podcast to discuss her work with the union and what she is doing to ensure more women are able to succeed in the trades. She also discussed the support she received from her union Brothers and Sisters while battling cancer.

Women have been joining the trades at a higher rate than at any time in the past, and there are several reasons why. For Brooks, the reason why she entered the building trades was to care for her family. After checking on the potential of joining the trades, she found out she could make the move from her non-union job to begin the Local 237 apprenticeship program. Brooks explained her first experience on the job, the support she received as an apprentice and learning to love the job and her union Brothers and Sisters.

Brooks is active in her Local and the Mid-America Carpenters Regional Council. She explained her efforts to get more women into the trades and how she further educated herself on the assistance available for women in the trades. Brooks spoke about the progress she has seen with Sisters in the Brotherhood throughout her time in the union. She has continued to advocate for the women in her union, including joining the Sisters Steering Committee at Local 237.

Finally, Brooks talked about her battle with breast cancer, which is now and remission, and the support she received from the Brotherhood. She added that it was not just her Carpenter Brothers and Sisters who helped take care of her through treatments, but all of the building trades in her area. If it was not for the union benefits Brooks earned, she said she and her family would not be in the good position they enjoy today. She added that whenever hard times come, she knows her union family will always be there to support her.

Listen to the show above to hear more about Brooks' thriving career opportunities with Carpenters Local 237.


America’s Work Force is the only daily labor podcast in the US and has been on the air since 1993, supplying listeners with useful, relevant input into their daily lives through fact-finding features, in-depth interviews, informative news segments and practical consumer reports. America’s Work Force is committed to providing an accessible venue in which America's workers and their families can hear discussion on important, relevant topics such as employment, healthcare, legislative action, labor-management relations, corporate practices, finances, local and national politics, consumer reports and labor issues.

America’s Work Force Union Podcast is brought to you in part by our sponsors: AFL-CIO, American Federation of Government Employees, American Federation of Musicians Local 4, Alliance for American Manufacturing, Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield, Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes-IBT, Boyd Watterson, Columbus/Central Ohio Building and Construction Trades Council, Communication Workers of America, Mechanical Insulators Labor Management Cooperative Trust, International Association of Heat and Frost Insulators and Allied Workers Local 50, International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, International Union of Bricklayers and Allied Crafts, International Union of Painters and Allied Trades District Council 6, Ironworkers Great Lakes District Council, Melwood, The Labor Citizen newspaper, Laborers International Union of North America, The National Labor Office of Blue Cross and Blue Shield, North Coast Area Labor Federation, Ohio Federation of Teachers, United Labor Agency, United Steelworkers.

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