Wednesday, March 8, 2017

Am I qualified?


“Hi” says my team “just to warn you, I've only been interpreting for one year now. I graduated from my ITP a few years ago”. This is said at a community meeting with political representatives doing the lectures. Everyone talking is a well educated professional, wearing a suit and tie.


This is an all too common occurrence. Upon arrival the terp realizes they should not be there. Now comes the blame game. Who's fault is it?  Are interpreters required to inquire on every job they take?  I have eleven different jobs this week. I don't have time to call every POC to get the details on the job. Then to take that information and determine my qualification for that position. By the time you realize you’re not the right fit, all other work on that day goes away


Should you ask the agency booking you?  By the time you go back and forth and determine it's ok, someone else has taken it. Asking for information on every job means you're the pain in the butt. This results in people not wanting to work with you.


What is the solution to this?  For me it is to make sure I am qualified for any job thrown my way.  But that is an unreasonable request to make.  Another solution is to work with a mentor, they can help you navigate the field to help you determine based on the dearth of information, whether or not you are qualified.


My solution is to assign a grade to the agencies I choose to work with.  I base their rates on how much additional work i need to do to prepare for and get paid for assignments.  The more information I receive up front the better their rating is.  The easier it is to get paid on the back end, the better their grade is.  The higher I rate the agency, the lower I charge them.  My rates range from $60/ hour up to $150/ hour.

Future posts will deal with working with agencies or not. Is it required and what does it mean.

A New Focus


I have given up traveling for a while and decided to focus my efforts on the educational needs of my community.  I will be posting on three main topics here:


  • Deaf Education
  • ASL (American Sign Language) fluency, development, linguistics
  • Interpreting

Hopefully you will find some insights and wisdom here not available from other sources.  In addition to my work here I will continue to post in various community forums to engage in a dialogue with others in these fields.