Philadelphia Court Interpreter Services Study

National Center for State Courts

  February 15, 1995

VIII.

CONCLUDING SUMMARY OF RECOMMENDATIONS

  The provision of interpreting services to Spanish-speaking linguistic minorities in Pennsylvania's First Judicial District is generally of high quality and appears to be excellent when compared with many of the nation's major metropolitan areas.

Consideration of implementing the recommendations contained in this report might best be guided by the following priorities:

·         Formally designating responsibility for oversight of all interpreting services with the Executive Administrator. This appears to be an important prerequisite for achieving consistent quality standards and the elimination of unnecessary costs for all language interpreter services, irrespective of court level, court division, language, or manner of compensation of interpreters (i.e., salaried vs. contract).

·         Exploring the feasibility of joining the joining the State Court Interpreter Certification Consortium by special arrangement with the Consortium Steering Committee, in order to secure affordable access to a wide range of valid and reliable oral interpreting proficiency tests for interpreters. ²⁰

^{Fn. 20} Through the Consortium, Philadelphia can acquire access to tests in Spanish, Vietnamese and Korean by the end of 1995. By the end of 1996, tests in Cambodian, Cantonese, Russian, Polish, Arabic Laotian, and French will also be available through the Consortium. These account for 10 of the 13 most commonly needed languages in Philadelphia, apart from sign language (see Table 7).

·         Achieving parity in compensation between interpreters and other position classes with similar responsibility and somewhat comparable educational or training requirements.

·         Taking action to extend the court's high standards for qualification of Spanish language interpreters into the non-Spanish languages, especially Korean, Vietnamese, Cambodian and Cantonese.