Posts

Woman standing in front of a presentation screen in a classroom

TLC Presents Spanish for Medical Professionals

/in , /by

TLC’s Genna Linton presented a 4-hour long training to 30 nurses at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center. The course, “Spanish for Medical Professionals: A Linguistic and Cultural Toolkit,” was focused on words, phrases, and cultural norms to help non-Spanish speaking nurses better relate to non-English speaking patients. This will potentially impact hundreds of patients working with these nurses. Just being able to ask if they are in pain or if they need water in the language the patient understands will improve the quality of care they are receiving.

Hand holding a glass globe over a stethoscope to signify medical interpreting

New Medical Interpreting Students Graduate

/in /by

Congratulations to the 14 students who graduated from the Tennessee Language Center’s Medical Interpreter Training session on Dec. 13. The students represented 3 states (Tennessee, Alabama, and Oklahoma), 5 Tennessee counties, and two languages (Spanish and Mandarin Chinese). Mandarin Chinese was a new language for TLC and increases our total number of languages served to date from 7 to 8. TLC’s program prepares students to take the test to become a certified medical interpreter through either the CCHI or the NBCMI, the two organizations that certify medical interpreters in the U.S. Find out more about TLC’s medical interpreting program.

Gavel resting on a desk with a book and balance in the background to illustrate our Court Interpreter Workshop

Fall Court Interpreter Workshop Concludes

/in , /by

The Fall Court Interpreter Workshop had 26 participants representing 16 counties in Tennessee. For the first time, an interpreter for Karen, the language spoken in Myanmar and parts of Thailand, took the course. This workshop provided by the Tennessee Language Center is the first step in becoming an interpreter with the Administrative Office of the Courts.

TLC Adds Two New Project Managers

/in /by

TLC welcomes Genna Linton and Aimee Dunphy as Interpretation & Translation project managers. Genna will focus on interpretation while Aimee focuses on translation.

Genna is a certified medical interpreter and most recently served as the bilingual front desk receptionist at Liberty Collegiate Academy in Nashville. She has a bachelor’s degree in Spanish and geography from the University of Georgia.

Most recently, Aimee was a test administrator for Pearson Professional Centers in Brentwood. She has a bachelor’s degree in Japanese from Ball State University in Indiana.

Gavel resting on a desk with a book and balance in the background to illustrate our Court Interpreter Workshop

27 Complete Summer Court Interpreter Workshop

/in /by

The Tennessee Language Center’s Summer Court Interpreter Workshop had 27 participants from 16 different counties and two states (TN and MS). Our students included a Metro Nashville Police Department officer who wanted to improve his interpreting skills in order to better assist the Hispanic community he serves, an Afghan refugee currently working as a Dari interpreter in community settings who wanted to expand his services to the legal field, and a polyglot African student who speaks English, Swahili, French, and Portuguese, who also wanted to take his interpreting skills to the next level. TLC’s Court Interpreter Workshop is an approved training program for court interpreters in the state of Tennessee consisting of 14 hours of training on the Tennessee court system, ethics and standards of practice, and interpreting skills.

 

Blue and white TLC icon

3 New Project Managers Join ITS Team

/in /by

We are so excited to welcome three new Project Managers to our Interpretation and Translation Department. ITS Project Managers serve as the point of contact external clients for interpretation and/or translation projects.

Headshot of woman with long curly hair Eileen Bernstein has served as a translator with TLC since 2020. She has a bachelor’s degree in Spanish from the University of New Hampshire and a master’s degree in political science from George Washington University.

Headshot of a woman in blue shirt with dark hairMahasweta Panigrahy has most recently worked as an early learning project coordinator at First Presbyterian Preschool in Franklin. Mahasweta holds degrees from Berhampur (India) University and the University of the Cumberlands.

Headshot of a woman with dark short hair and glassesAdrian McDaniel is a former program manager for International Scholarship and Tuition Services Inc. Adrian holds a bachelor’s degree in international relations with minors in French and Spanish from Middle Tennessee State University; as well as a master’s in international business from Southern New Hampshire University.

Welcome, Eileen, Mahasweta and Adrian!

Man with mustache wearing a baseball cap and t-shirt

TLC Provides Interpretation for TIMES Reporter Doing COVID-19 Article

/in /by

TLC Project Manager and Interpreter Richard Ponce de Leon assisted TIME Magazine journalist Abigail Abrams interview six Spanish-speaking migrant workers in East Tennessee. Abrams was writing an article on COVID-19 vaccine rollout across the nation. The workers harvest and process tomatoes at Jones & Church Farm in Unicoi, Tennessee.

Read the published article here.

A gavel resting on a desk

21 Students Complete First Step in Court Interpretation Certification

/in , /by

Congratulations to the 21 Court Interpreter Students who completed the TN State Court Interpreter Ethics and Skills Building Workshop at the Tennessee Language Center on June 7, 2021.  The workshop is the first requirement to becoming a Certified Court Interpreter in the State of Tennessee.

The students were from the U.S., Spain, and Mexico and representing the following languages: Spanish, Swahili, Kinyarwanda, Arabic, Portuguese, and French. These students will now be put in direct contact with the TN Administrative Office of the Courts , which will guide them through the remainder of the court interpreter registration and, eventually, certification process, after which they will begin interpreting in courts and attorney offices statewide.

Two TLC employees at the Conference

Municipal Court Clerks in TN Learn about Importance of Accurate Interpreting

/in /by

Some translation mistakes can have a lasting, if mostly harmless, impact. Like early Biblical translators thinking Moses was “horned” instead of “radiant,” leading to some really interesting sculptures, statues, and illuminations of Moses with horns on his head. Or people thinking that Mars had manmade “canals” on it instead of erosion-created “channels” due to a translation error. But other translation mistakes can have lifelong, or even deadly, consequences, as Richard Ponce-de-Leon Monosalva, Interpretation & Translation Project Manager, illustrated during his presentation “Language Access in the Courts” at a recent MTAS Conference for Municipal Court Clerks from across Tennessee on May 21.

TLC provides certified court interpreters, and also offers training for court interpretation throughout the year.