STATE REPRESENTATIVE
Robert Sanchez
Serving the 25th Assembly District
Legislative Office Building, Room 4018
Hartford, CT 06106-1591
Capitol: 800-842-8267
Robert.Sanchez@cga.ct.gov
THE BARBERSHOP APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAM
Barbering was traditionally learned through an apprenticeship, but a current statute requires the completion of formal education and training programs to qualify for licensure. These programs can be costly. This year, we passed a new state law that creates a Labor Department-approved barber apprenticeship program to grant barber licenses to applicants who successfully complete the program and meet other requirements, including 2,000 hours of work experience in approved trade training. This measure will ease prior requirements that made it difficult for aspiring barbers to obtain their licenses.
FUNDING FOR LOCAL YOUTH ORGANIZATIONS
This session, my colleagues and I were able to secure funding that supports various youth violence prevention programs in our city. The state funding allocated to Prudence Crandall Center, Family Enrichment Center, OIC of New Britain, Pathway Senderos and HRA of New Britain will help these organizations maintain their excellent programs that help decrease youth violence and juvenile incarceration in our community. It is encouraging to work with these remarkable organizations and our police department in an effort to provide more productive options for our young people.
LANGUAGE INTERPRETERS IN HOSPITALS
Connecticut is a diverse state, with people from all over the world settling and establishing their lives here. With this in mind, we are now requiring that interpreter services be available to patients whose primary language is spoken by at least 5% of the population residing in the hospital’s geographic service area.
ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS
This year, a bilingual education workgroup convened to better understand the needs of English Language Learners (ELLs) and grapple with our state’s staggering achievement gap. We are now requiring the State Department of Education to develop standards for students receiving longer periods of instruction and annually report on the progress of these students. We are also creating a pilot program in four towns and cities to identify best practices and provide more administrative support to all schools in Connecticut. Moreover, districts will not be penalized with low rankings when these students perform poorly on standardized tests in their first two years of learning English. Finally, we directed Regional Education Service Centers to study and recommend ways that districts with low numbers of ELL students may still receive quality instruction.