Utility worker internship levelsplaying field for all CT students

The 2024 UI Trade Interns join UWUA members/UI line crew, including Moses Rams (center) at the Trumbull Training Yard in July 2024.
United Illuminating
The 2024 UI Trade Interns join UWUA members/UI line crew, including Moses Rams (center) at the Trumbull Training Yard in July 2024.
As the 21-year president of the Utility Workers Union of America (UWUA) Local 470-1 and a 35-year veteran of United Illuminating, developing the current and future front-line union workforce of Connecticut’s utility companies is one of my most important priorities.
As Connecticut relies even more on the electric grid for everyday uses, developing a front-line workforce that is up to the task of maintaining it, executing plans to improve it, and restoring our customers quickly during its outages is becoming even more essential. That requires us to identify young people, including students, who can succeed in this critical field. By identifying them early, we can ensure they get the very best hands-on training and internships to set them up for success.
That’s why UWUA Local 470-1, United Illuminating (UI), and UI’s parent company Avangrid are proud to have partnered to build one of the first internship programs in the country that develops the skills of high school students to succeed as future front-line utility workers. Through this work, we’re doing more than investing in the future of Connecticut’s energy system. We’re also doing the real work of equity, leveling the playing field so all the communities we serve have an opportunity to build a stable, rewarding career path at an electric utility.
The internship program that UWUA, UI, and Avangrid have now unveiled in its second year offers a 10-week paid internship for rising seniors who attend trade high schools in UI’s local service area. It’s an on-the-ground training program in utility lineworking, where members of UI’s line crew teach students how to climb poles, use lineworking equipment, operate a bucket truck, identify solutions to power outages, and much more, all with safety top of mind.
Our team spent much of this past school year visiting trade high schools across the UI service area and recruiting students for the program. No matter if we were at Bullard Havens in Bridgeport, Emmett O’Brien in Ansonia, Eli Whitney in Hamden, or somewhere else, it was clear students were hungry for the opportunity we were presenting.
In a culture where college is often the first — or even the only — choice presented to high school students, we’re offering another path for the ones who may be better suited for a career in the trades.
Was building this program a simple process? No. It took several years of planning between UWUA, UI, and Avangrid to bring the trade internship program to life. It took hours of collaboration, brainstorming, time-intensive meetings, and presentations to all our leaders before there was complete confidence that a real, effective, hands-on training program for 17- and 18-year-olds could be done safely.
But as we continue to push onward with our second year of this program, and as we are now considering even more opportunities with other schools and organizations to teach our essential skills to the next generation, I can say one thing with certainty: it’s worth it.
In a culture where college is often the first — or even the only — choice presented to high school students, we’re offering another path for the ones who may be better suited for a career in the trades.
We don’t care where those students grew up, what they look like, or what language they speak at home. Come to the UI Yard any morning of the week, and you’ll see diversity in action, as all of us — men, women, Black, white, Hispanic, you name it — get ready to get the job done for our customers. This internship program shows young people first-hand that no matter who they are, they’re just like us, and they have a chance to build a tremendously bright future for themselves and their families. That’s leveling the playing field. That’s equity.
And while it’s certainly a benefit to students, it’s a great opportunity for all of us, too. After all, the team of lineworkers who supervise them, as their role models, are encouraged and inspired to be the best versions of themselves, and company management can demonstrate to all their stakeholders, including Connecticut policymakers, that we at Avangrid and UI are fully committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion. I’d also add that it’s a boon for Connecticut, which reaps the reward of having a local union workforce trained up in a 125-year-old company based in and serving our state.
State policymakers can be an asset and resource to build incentives for more businesses to say “yes” to the important work of building equity through hands-on internship programs. One thing’s for certain, it will be a team effort: neither government, nor unions, nor businesses can do this work alone. But the example we’ve set in south-central Connecticut shows that a little partnership and a lot of hard work can go a long way as we build the front-line union workforce of tomorrow.
Moses Rams is the President of the Utility Workers Union of America Local 470-1 and the Chief Line Crew Leader at United Illuminating (UI).
Author and cartoonist Peter Steiner signed books at Sharon Summer Book Signing last summer.
The 27th annual Sharon Summer Book Signing at the Hotchkiss Library of Sharon will be held Friday, Aug. 1, from 4:45 to 7:30 p.m.; Saturday, Aug. 2, from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.; and Sunday, Aug. 3, at noon.
Friday’s festivities will honor libraries and the power of the written word. In attendance will be 29 locally and nationally recognized authors whose books will be for sale. With a wide array of genres including historical fiction, satire, thrillers, young adult and non-fiction, there will be something for every reader.
The event will include a selection of hors d’oeuvres and drinks, followed by eight festive author dinners where writers will read and discuss their work one-on-one with attendees.
Saturday will feature a new Page to Plate program that merges the literary and culinary worlds. Just as writing is a practice of patience and love, so too is the art of cooking. Cookbooks and food writing make cooking teachable to those excited to learn and celebrate the art of a perfect meal.
Through a combination of demonstrations and conversations, acclaimed cookbook authors and chefs will cover a variety of delicious topics. Highlights include a discussion with Chris Morocco, food director of “Bon Appetit” magazine and “Epicurious.” Sharon resident and chef Jessie Sheehan will demonstrate recipes from her cookbook “Salty, Cheesy, Herby, Crispy Snackable Bakes: 100 Easy-Peasy, Savory Recipes for 24/7 Deliciousness.”
With the combination of vetted recipes and thorough discussion from food experts, attendees are sure to leave knowing how to cultivate the ultimate act of service: the gift of a full stomach.
Sunday will be brunch at a private Sharon residence hosted by Graham Klemm and Cody O’Kelly to celebrate author Carolyn Klemm and her cookbook “Culinary Collection: Favorite Country Recipes.”
For more information and to purchase tickets, visit hotchkisslibraryofsharon.org
All proceeds support the programs at The Hotchkiss Library of Sharon.
Ukraine Emergency Fundraiser at The Stissing Center in 2022 raised over $120,000 for Sunflower of Peace.
The spirit of Ukraine will be on display at the Stissing Center in Pine Plains on Sunday, July 27. Beginning at 5 p.m., the “Words to America from Ukraine” fundraiser is set to showcase the simultaneous beauty of Ukrainian culture and the war-time turmoil it faces, all the while fundraising in support of Ukrainian freedom.
“Words to America from Ukraine” aims to remind and spread awareness for the suffering that often gets forgotten by those who live in comfortable worlds, explained Leevi Ernits, an organizer for the event. “We are trying to make an attempt to remind people that we are human, and we are connected with human values,” she said. “With very few words, poetry can express very deep values.”
Sponsored by the Town of Stanford, Friends of Ukraine, L.E. Design LLC, Bartelby & Sage, Oblong Books and Borshch of Art, the fundraiser will host the recitation of war-time Ukrainian poetry. Readings will include the works of Vasyl Sagaydak, Oksana Lutsyshyna, Serhiy Zhadan, Victoria Amelina, Marjana Savka, Ostap Slyvynsky, and Mariana Harahonych.
“Poems are fishhooks into our souls,” added Mark Lagus, another event organizer, explaining why poetry was chosen for the main event.
Guests will also enjoy a performance by Ukrainian Village Voices, a New York City- based band dedicated to preserving and promoting traditional Ukraining Folk music. The evening will also feature speakers Jed Sunden and Maria Genkin, along with a live auction. Food and drink will be provided by Bartelby & Sage, a sustainable, local and female-owned company.
All ticket proceeds, bids, and donations will go directly to Razom for Ukraine, a U.S.-based nonprofit. Razom, meaning “together” in Ukrainian, has the mission of “contributing to the establishment of a secure, prosperous and democratic Ukraine,” through “creating, inspiring, and collaborating on initiatives that motivate people to think, partner and do.”
Tickets, donation opportunities, and more information are all available by visiting www.wordsfromukraine.org
Celebrating its 45th year, the Grumbling Gryphons will perform at HVRHS Friday, Aug. 1, at 7 p.m.
The Grumbling Gryphons Traveling Children’s Theater is preparing to celebrate its 45th year — not with fanfare, but with feathers, fabric, myth, chant, and a gala finale bursting with young performers and seasoned artists alike.
The Gryphons’ 2025 Summer Theater Arts Camp begins July 28 and culminates in a one-night-only performance gala at Housatonic Valley Regional High School on Friday, Aug. 1 at 7 p.m. Founder, playwright, and artistic director, Leslie Elias has been weaving together the worlds of myth, movement and theater for decades.
“We’re a touring company that is participatory,” Elias said with her trademark storytelling cadence. “Even when there’s no pre-performance workshop, it’s still participatory. Always.”
Founded in 1980 “in a little basement apartment on the lower east side with co-founder Vanessa Roe,” said Elias,Grumbling Gryphons (recipients of the 2003 Connecticut Governor’s Arts Award) has long occupied a unique niche: part performance troupe, part educational outreach, part community ritual. Whether dramatizing Greek myths, Native American legends, or original tales about bees and bogs, the company’s ethos centers on inclusion, transformation, and hands-on engagement.
This summer’s camp offers children ages six and up five fast-paced days of storytelling, acting, mask-making, and rehearsal. The first three days will take place at Elias’s own home studio — a tucked-away space filled with costumes, puppets, and instruments — before moving into full performance prep mode.
“In the ideal world, we would have more time,” she laughed. “It’s a lot of pressure to be performing for the public after five days. But we’re going to do our best.”
The gala performance, she explained, is a kind of theatrical mosaic — scenes and excerpts from Grumbling Gryphons’ vast repertoire, some showcasing seasoned adult performers and others giving campers center stage. The cast will include returning campers, newcomers, and guest artists drawn from the Gryphons’ decades-spanning circle of collaborators including mask maker and artist Ellen Moon.
“We’re still figuring out exactly what we’ll do,” said Elias, “but it’s kind of like a smorgasbord… a celebration. And it’s open — if anybody wants to get their kids involved, or even volunteer, we welcome you.”
Photo provided
Elias’s own theater background winds through early improvisational schools, Viennese dance traditions, and experimental spaces like Henry Street Settlement. As a child on Long Island, she studied with jazz pianist Ivan Fiedel and dancer Rosalind Fiedel, eccentric mentors who nurtured her taste for the surreal and spontaneous.
“Mr. Fiedel was a character,” she recalled. “He would smoke a cigar… and take the cigar in his ear and the smoke would come out the other end. I don’t know how he did it.”
Elias built Grumbling Gryphons with this sense of magic — not as a traditional company, but as a living, evolving story in itself. Whether working with preschoolers or middle-schoolers, audiences in botanical gardens or historic town halls, the Gryphons invite kids to become creators — to chant, to improvise, to embody archetypes from ancient lore or environmental parables.
And that’s what this summer’s camp and gala are all about. “It’s more than theater,” Elias said. “It’s myth, poetry, movement — it’s about building self-esteem, imagination. It’s about transformation.”
For more information, to register a child for the 2025 Summer Theater Camp, or to inquire about volunteering, visit grumblinggryphons.org
Attendees practive brushstrokes led by calligraphy teacher Debby Reelitz.
Calligrapher Debby Reelitz came to the David M. Hunt Library to give a group of adults and children an introduction to modern calligraphy Thursday, July 17.
Reelitz said she was introduced to calligraphy as a youngster and has been a professional calligrapher and teacher for more than 25 years.
She said there is no age barrier to learning the basics. “Once children can hold a pen or pencil, they can do it.”
Reelitz said her 5th-grade teacher introduced her to the art.
Then her mother pressed her into service doing the lettering for “4-H certificates and gift cards.”
Reelitz handed out a sampler and blank sheets of paper and then turned to the easel for demonstration purposes.
She noted that the letters (I,T,H,L,E and F) on the top row of the sampler were not alphabetically arranged.
Rather, they comprised a “latter family” of similar shapes.
Soon enough the entire group of six adults and three children were concentrating and turning out decent versions of the letters
Reelitz alternately demonstrated and encouraged the novices.
“Remember, this is not an instant gratification skill.”