New California Sexual Harassment Prevention Training Law

Dental continuing education now includes training regarding the recognition and prevention of sexual harassment in the workplace. Sexual harassment has been a longstanding workplace problem that has recently received a great deal of increased publicity due to several high-profile cases in the entertainment industry. Unfortunately, this issue extends across all professions and workplaces, including dental offices, where individuals interact on an interpersonal level. The State of California has recognized the need to pass legislation that provides a safer working environment for all employees and management. The State of California now requires all employers, including dental practices, with 5 or more employees to provide all employees with 1 hour of sexual harassment training every 2 years. It also mandates 2 hours of sexual harassment training be provided for "supervisors" every 2 years. This training covers issues including definitions of sexual harassment, what actions constitute harassment, statistics regarding prevalence of sexual harassment, recognizing harassment, prevention measures for dental offices, employee and supervisor responsibilities, language and multicultural issues, and training requirements.

California passed this legislation, SB 1343, following the great outpouring of outrage over the #MeToo movement. The legislation covers training of both supervisory and non-supervisory employees. All employees must receive 1 hour of training within 6 months of their hiring, and then repeated once every 2 years. For temporary or seasonal employees, the training must be provided within 30 days of their hiring date. The training may be on an individual or group basis, or broken into shorter segments as long as the training totals the 1 hour or 2 hour threshold.

Here at Dental Didactics Dental Didactics CE we are preparing a 1-hour credit self-instructional CE course to meet this requirement for our clients who are employees, as well as a 2-hour credit CE course for our clients who are supervisors. They will be offered at profession-leading pricing to help dental practices make compliance with SB 1343 and documentation reasonable and affordable. We look forward to assisting dental practices in meeting this new regulatory requirement.