Nicole Espeland already had a career. It just wasn鈥檛 the right one for her.
An interest in welding offered the possibility of a different path, but Espeland wasn鈥檛 sure she had the courage to follow it. 鈥淚 was scared to start over and start something new that I had no knowledge in,鈥 she said. 鈥(And) I had concerns about being a woman in a male-dominated industry.鈥
According to the American Welding Society, only about 5 percent of professional welders in the U.S. are women but the number is increasing.
