Community Projects - Up Coming Projects
Professional Aboriginal Interpreter Accreditation Project. PAIAP
By Jennifer Newton and Lorraine Huddle 14 September 2008.
The power of Rotary is amazing.
I have a little story to tell you which demonstrates clearly how the networking and pro bono expertise of Rotarians can achieve so much. Our small club of 24 members has facilitated an historical event over 4000 kilometres away. It is a project which meets the fundamental mission of Rotary – which is to enable Rotarians to advance world understanding, goodwill, and peace through the improvement of health, the support of education, and the alleviation of poverty.
It is the beginning of a long overdue upgrade of educational opportunities for interpreters of Aboriginal languages to professional level. This will facilitate greater understanding between the cultures of all aboriginal Australians and the legal, health and education systems in Australia.
It all started when a mother and daughter were talking. The daughter was a Public Prosecutor in Darwin, and the mother an incoming President of our Club. The daughter mentioned that there were no Aboriginal language interpreters with professional accreditation and what was more there was no facility for anyone to become accredited.
Current formal qualifications for interpreters of aboriginal languages are only at the paraprofessional level however the interpreters are required to interpret at a much higher level in many situations, for example in court or hospital interpreting, without the minimum qualifications for these tasks.
The National Accreditation Authority for Translators and Interpreters provides training and examinations for over 25 languages, but despite repeated requests has not provided training or testing in any aboriginal language. The Aboriginal Interpreter Service is responsible for all training and testing for the 200 or so paraprofessional interpreters registered with them.
The President contacted the aboriginal interpreter’s service in Darwin to find out more. She discovered that about 4 years ago a feasibility study had been undertaken by Dr Michael Cooke, but funding to implement it had been rejected by the National Accreditation board. The Aboriginal Interpreter Service was very interested in developing a pilot study and provided a costing to train 6 paraprofessional interpreters to professional level. This came to $31,000 of which they could give $11,000. The Rotary Club of Darwin was contacted; they were delighted, and offered $1000.
The remaining money was raised by members of our club with contacts through corporate sponsors, and our club donation of $5000. A problem arose as the corporate sponsors governance needed tax deductibility, and as we are an incorporated entity in Victoria, a third party in the NT was needed for the project. This involved lengthy legal and financial paperwork, which was undertaken pro bono by one two of our members. It was very encouraging to see the enthusiastic support of our corporate donors Trust Company Ltd, Russell Investment Group, MLC Implemented Consulting for this project.
The president was introduced to a member of the Rotary Club of Darwin, the former Chief Justice of the Northern Territory, who was impressed with the project and suggested the Arnhem Land Progress Association Inc as the third party.
The funds were used to fly the candidates to Darwin, accommodation and food costs for the two week training and examination, the National Accreditation Board fees for each candidate and to engage linguists from the Charles Darwin University to write examinations and tests which were also approved by the National Accreditation Authority. The tests and examination have been written in template form so they can be used for other aboriginal languages in the near future.
The project has been 1 year in coming to fruition. The interpreter service in Darwin advertised for 6 places, and 15 suitable people applied. On the 1st September, eleven people from East Arnhem Land have enthusiastically attended the training session and they are currently undergoing the examination. The language chosen for the initial program is an East Arnhem Djambarrpuyngu language which is understood by several dialects.
The project won the Rotary District 9810 Vocational Service Award for 2007-8 and it is hoped that the relevant Governments throughout Australia will view this pilot project as worthy of continuing, and more languages will be represented by accredited interpreters. The Aboriginal Interpreters already demonstrate and provide a professional approach to their work. The opportunity to gain accreditation at the professional level will give them the recognition that has until now been denied them, not as a result of their inability to reach such a level but due to the fact that there was no way to do so.
Such things can happen from a little chat; when the power of Rotary is brought into action.
