Expert Fab - Jon
Quickly off the top of my head, I believe there are several female CWIs out there and a quite a few SS&WSIs. I don't see it as rare and unique.
I believe the longest serving female AWS CWI is Anna Petroski. I mention her name because many people have attended her wonderful seminars (ATEMA Solutions), and she probably has quite some name recognition! I know of five other female CWIs and Two (International Code Council / International Conference of Building Officials) - Structural Steel & Welding Special Inspectors, who are not CWIs.
I know one female CWB welding inspector up in Quebec. I was doing QA and she was one of the in-house QC inspectors on a bridge job I was assigned to. She was quite dilligent and quite competent. I also heard that there was one other female CWB (active) at that same company in Quebec. I was told that one of the female welders on night shift gave up her CWB so that she could go back to welding on the night shift with her husband. (The CWBs were subject to sudden and indeterminate length shift changes, which is inconvenient for a solid marriage.) So, that would be three female CWBs in one company!
I know of one female CWI who was even nominated to be "CWI of the Year" a while ago, (when the ink was barely dry on her CWI card.) There was a feature length article published about her in the Welding Journal. Back in the early '90s there was a female CWI who owned a testing lab in upstate NY, and had three male CWI working for her, who was nominated for "CWI of the Year".
I know of two other females, who supposedly were CWIs, but lost the credential due to inactivity. (One became a PE for a large Egineering Firm in New Jersey, and the other went to jail for drug sales!) I know of another female CWB inspector who was also married to an AWS CWI/CWE, who lost his job as a educator and couldn't work in education any more as part of a plea bargain agreement. He couldn't go to Canada with her (his wife) because of his plea bargain, (Felony record) and so she was talking about becomming an AWS CWI so they could both work in the United States. Then, he didn't renew his CWI for some reason, and they both supposedly got mixed up in drugs and went to jail!
In AWS, we have Pam Michalski who is a PE and a CWI on the B-5 Committee. There may be more. HG/tx from the Forum might be a CWI / PE.
I do not know if there any statistics on male / female numbers, or M/F ratios, but I suspect that there are several more females than the average male CWI or welder has run into..