FJC Workshop for
Federal Court Interpreters

The anatomy of the profession was laid bare recently when the Court Education Division of the Federal Judicial Center sponsored a two-day workshop for court interpreters in Albuquerque, New Mexico. About 125 staff and freelance interpreters from all over the country attended. The last opportunity to share information in a forum of this kind was in 1993, and they clearly relished the occasion to report from far-flung precincts and receive updates on national trends and issues.

In Puerto Rico, staff interpreters are routinely directed by their judges to cover civil cases, although they receive no extra compensation for it. In Texas, a Chief Judge sees no reason to authorize a computer for a staff interpreter who prepares translations. In Arizona, it is not unusual for interpreters to cover upwards of 50 matters daily. In California, a new, easy-to-use Windows-based program calculates interpreter workload statistics. In North Dakota, the Clerk insisted that a non-certified interpreter be used in court because it was more cost-effective. In some courts, interpreter rotation is considered an unseemly luxury. Compliance with the Court Interpreters Act is far from uniform in the district courts across the country, but the Administrative Office has no enforcement authority. And, by the way, recently the Administrative Office’s Court Interpreters Advisory Subgroup recommended that per diem rates remain stagnant.

It will soon be twenty years since the Court Interpreters Act became law, but as the stories above reveal, each district continues to be a world unto itself. Still, court interpreters are united in their desire to communicate the excitements and frustrations of their work in the legal arena. The agenda was developed in response to interpreter requests and reflected the interdisciplinary nature of the profession. A statistician from the U.S Census Bureau did a detailed presentation of population trends; an attorney with the AO’s Office of Legislative Affairs pointed out recent and upcoming legislation that may have an impact on the courts’ caseloads (for a copy of his handout, contact NAJIT headquarters); a linguist highlighted sixteen interpreters whose interaction with conquerors, historians, anthropologists or priests played a key role in cultural history. Here were also roll-up-your-sleeves sessions on note-taking, telephone interpreting and videoconferencing; a panel on concerns common to judges, attorneys, court personnel and interpreters; an update on the status of the interpreting program from the AO; a session on the Internet and other terminology resources; a dynamic demonstration by interpreters for the deaf; and last but not least, separate small group discussions for staff and freelancers, with subsequent reports to the full group on a variety of professional issues such as working conditions, continuing education, networking, and freelance interpreter concerns.

It was a working weekend with a fast-paced agenda that kept everyone moving.

Among the points about which consensus was reached: the time has come for more focused judge and attorney training on interpreter issues; more should be done to bring all district courts into compliance with the Court Interpreters Act; staff interpreter offices would benefit from the capacity to share terminology files electronically; interpreting for the deaf raises many new issues for interpreter coordinators, not the least of which is understanding the diversity of the deaf community; computer support and training is essential for staff offices; and continuing education is a must for interpreters’ professional development and should be encouraged by the courts.

The meeting ended with renewed commitments among staff offices to keep in touch. A prolonged standing ovation attested to the participants’ gratitude for the FJC’s superb organization of this long-overdue national meeting.