State Sen. Beth Bye of West Hartford will be the Senate Chair of the Higher Education and Advancement Committee for the current legislative session.

Submitted

State Sen. Beth Bye (D-West Hartford) has been appointed as the Democratic Senate Chair of the Higher Education and Employment Advancement Committee for the 2017-18 legislative session. The appointment was announced Thursday by Democratic State Senate President Pro Tempore Martin M. Looney of New Haven.

“Connecticut relies on our highly qualified college graduates to retain our competitive advantage over other states in national rankings when it comes to a well-trained workforce and a very high quality of life. I intend to reinforce and expand on the size and the quality of those college graduates who want to learn and stay here in Connecticut,” Bye said.

“One of my platforms when running for re-election this past fall was making Connecticut a more attractive place for young people to want to stay and work. Part of that is our higher education opportunities, and part of that is what’s available to them after graduation as far as employment that pays the kind of decent wage and benefits that you need to live in Connecticut. The legislature has laid a lot of groundwork in those areas over the past several years with huge investments in our state college campuses and in supporting and expanding some of the aerospace and biomedical firms here in Connecticut. So I think the framework is there, we just have to ensure that it remains strong in the face of what I know is going to be some very serious budget pressure.”

Bye had previously served as Senate Chair of the Higher Education and Employment Advancement Committee from 2010-2014, before becoming co-chair of the Appropriations Committee in November 2015. She resigned from the Appropriations Committee in November.

The Higher Education and Employment Advancement Committee has cognizance over all matters relating to the state Board of Regents for Higher Education and the Office of Higher Education, and of public and independent institutions of higher education, private occupational schools, post‑secondary education, job training institutions and programs, apprenticeship training programs and adult job training programs offered to the public by any state agency or funded in whole or in part by the state.

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