The EC Foundation awarded an iGrant to the Sign Language/Interpreter Training Program this semester.
During the course of one year, the grant will enhance students’ sign language and communication skills for potential employment as interpreters for the deaf, Professor Sandra Bartiromo, sign language interpreter training program coordinator, said.
The Trilingual Interpreter Training Project will specifically benefit sign language majors and students who pass a Spanish proficiency test. Students enrolled in the program are provided with real world strategies as well as mentoring for job opportunities by working practitioners.
“Experts from within the field will come and provide workshops and training that run simultaneously with the students’ courses on Saturdays,” Bartiromo said. “They’ll be helping them get jobs in our field for the Hispanic deaf consumers.”
According to Bartiromo, trilingual interpreters can earn anywhere from $55 to $65 an hour working in the medical, education and legal sectors.
“There is a national shortage in general for interpreter practitioners, but adding the trilingual component, people who already speak Spanish will have a better edge in the market,”Bartiromo said.
Currently, 25 students are participating in the program.
“As a trilingual interpreter I feel like I can go out there and help some of the elementary schools,” Vanessa Cazares, 24, sign language interpreting major, said. “You can just bump into a random stranger and help them.”
Starting 35 years ago, EC has offered beginning through advanced sign language courses, but it wasn’t until 1981 that a degree applicable interpreter-training program was established.
“We’ve been here for 35 years putting our program together,” Bartiromo said. “We have a national reputation and hopefully we can expand and we’ll be able to offer courses on trilingual interpreting,” she said.