SOURCE: Women Building Futures– In celebration of Mother’s Day, we share the story of Akiesha, who teaches us that with perseverance, the future is limitless. Her story of grit and passion inspires the next generation of women power engineers.
Akiesha immigrated to Canada from the Caribbean for new opportunities for herself and her family.
With her move came the challenge of finding a new career that allowed her to use her love for math and physics and work with her hands. After extensive research, she found that power engineering was right up her alley.
Akeisha, a graduate of the Women Building Futures Power Engineer Career Accelerator program, had the added challenge of completing her studies while supporting her children with learning online during the COVID-19 pandemic.
She supported her children through the day and stayed up late at night to complete her own studies. Akiesha was never one to backdown from a challenge and worked hard to successfully complete her program.
“I was tutoring my other children during COVID, and I had a 1-year-old to care for, and on top of all that, I had my WBF courses. It was a challenge, but I always believe I could do something if I put my mind to it,” shares Akiesha. She adds she was grateful for the support Women Building Futures provided throughout her learning journey. “Women Building Futures has done a lot for me; everyone was always around and encouraged me.”
Akiesha is now a 3rd class power engineer.
She comes home from work filled with passion and love for what she does. Akiesha shares her enthusiasm with her children in the hopes of inspiring them to consider a career in power engineering or the skilled trades.
And it looked like she did. Her love for power engineering has inspired her daughter, Jamielia, to follow in her footsteps. “My daughter told me, ‘You are always so happy whenever you come home from work. You are always happy when you talk about work. What do you think if I take it?’ And I told her, ‘You want it? Go for it!’” says Akiesha.
Jamielia is now a 4th class power engineer. “I’m proud of her. As a mom, you want the best for your children. Watching my daughter follow me let me know that I did a good job because I was a single mother with her. For me, watching her come into this field and enjoy it just as much as I do, it feels like I did my job as a mom,” shares Akiesha.
Akiesha hopes other women might also consider power engineering. “I’m hoping I can encourage women my age to shift careers, and I hope my daughter can encourage women her age to consider the field. The sky is the limit, really.
“You can do whatever you desire. Your race or gender does not matter. What matters is the individual—you.”
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The “POWER” of vocational training at its best. Beautiful!
Excellent mom, well done 👍🏾
Congratulations just like oil refining hope you don’t have to spend much time outside during the winter …its brutal
Excellent story..keep up that passion and you will make it even further.
Great but don’t come back antigua to apply your expertise, because you will be fight down by the square pegs here that has political entitlement to there job and has nothing to offer, a case in hand is the Apua electricity manager who never did any work in that electrical field put aside his book theory on the introductory. No standards and measurements in Apua, no development of modernize techniques to mitigate power suppression, and he harvest a subordinate team that’s the same going no where, and other progressive engineers he victimize so they don’t out shine him, go girl because one day when we have a change and there is inquiry into the negligence of Apua assets like power generator purposely allowed to deteriorate to give a private concern a contract I can see jail for someone. And you professionals will come home to build our power infrastructure.
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