For Women in Construction Week, we’re talking to the incredible women who make everything we do at Texas Materials possible. As a materials and construction company, we have a direct impact on our environment, so environmental safety and compliance is extremely important to us. In this video, Christine Hanson describes her path into the construction industry and what she finds rewarding about the job.
Transcript
Hi, I’m Christine Hanson, and I’m the environmental specialist for Texas Materials and Texas Concrete. I have a strong science background that fueled me to go get my Masters in Environmental Health. I’m an environmental specialist, and so that entails me upholding environmental compliance for the company. In doing so, I report annually to all federal, state, county and city officials on annual basis. I also make sure that we are doing our environmental due diligence. In doing so, I help with the permitting process, as well as train our employees on all of their environmental responsibilities at their facilities. I also collect the data for the sustainability report to corporate, so that we can share that information with our stakeholders.
I got into this industry through being an intern. I was working on my Masters. In doing so, I entered in the EHS department, the Environmental Health and Safety department. I fell in love with my team, and then later got to go and learn the business from us getting the aggregate out of the quarry, dragging it out on the rails to the plants, and then turning it into either asphalt or concrete. I really enjoy the fact that I don’t just work in an office and I get to experience that. So, that’s what made me want to do construction. My interning experience was very unique. I didn’t share the same experience as most of the other interns, which got to jump around from different lines of business to learn the business. I came in in the Environmental Health and Safety department and in doing so, I still got to go to all the facilities and learn the lines of the business but in a different way. I was always looking at it from a safety and environmental standpoint. I had a really good team that really took the time to take me to all the facilities, and then I got different small projects that I got to work on. In doing so, I was able to find a little project that I could continue working on while I went back to school. So I graduated and I took my full-time offer here.
So a notable and interesting experience that I have, which I can cross off my bucket list, is seeing the blasting at the Marble Falls Quarry. It’s definitely something that everybody should experience. Also, something I do really enjoy about my job is getting to meet all of our employees, new hires, our employees in the field, getting to share with them and talk with them. I do cherish those moments, I really do enjoy getting to talk with them.
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