A bunch of people you take from a generic group of workers and suddenly you decide to make them do something can hardly be considered "specialists". I mean they will become specialists AFTER you put them to work but while they are in that pool they are just a bunch of people old enough to work. If the word Artisans is not perfect either (because they don't work "yet") at least it attracts less attention on that paradox.
You could maybe want to call them "workers", if the problem is that they include farmers and you do not want to call farmers "artisans".
But the word "artisans" is my favorite since it holds an ancient Latin\medieval connotation that the word "specialists" just doesn't have.
(Also the skill "green thumb" should be "hunter"... My mom has a green thumb, not a fantasy hero. ...Gosh what would Stardock do without me bitching about these things! Any time they don't find the words just PM me!)
Any opinions any other terms you would like to see changed?