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Having created the telecommunications technology to help the deaf and hearing impaired to converse over the phone, Sorenson Communications now is focusing on developing skilled interpreters to complete the connection.
The company has established the VRS Interpreting Institute at its Taylorsville headquarters, setting up classrooms for a half-dozen faculty members and building a 30-station lab where students can train -- and see how well they performed -- on the video relay service (VRS) videophones pioneered by Sorenson Communications.
"Our goal is to be the premier training site for sign language instructors," said Chris Wakeland, the company's vice president of interpreting.
The institute is not intended to take people off the street and turn them into interpreters. Instead, it is targeting the 1,500 graduates of North America's 150 programs that teach American Sign Language, people who have the basics down but not the practical skills needed to be fluent interpreters, whatever the subject matter.
And it can be used to help teachers in those dispersed programs do their jobs even better.
"We want to offer training to them so they can better assess their students and write tests better so that their students are better prepared to do the job when they graduate," Wakeland added.
To get the program rolling, Sorenson Communications hired Carolyn Ball as the institute's first executive director.
She became interested
"I just lived with deaf people, and they told me what I did right or what I did wrong," she said.
What's wrong with the current system, Ball said, is that the Americans with Disabilities Act spelled out situations in which the deaf have the right to an interpreter -- such as dealing with schools or government agencies -- but provided little training for interpreters.
Interpreting can be tough work, she noted, leading to a high turnover rate. And it can be challenging to accurately convey the intended message, either from speaker through sign language to a deaf person or vice versa.
"It's particularly hard when you can be talking about family stuff, banking transactions, cars or signing up for classes," Wakefield said. "You can do a disservice to people if you don't interpret well."
The program Ball is developing allows students to handle interpretation scenarios, then go back through the videophone system to see if the message they conveyed matched what they really intended to convey. And to get better at it.
She is designing the system to be flexible, so that it can be tailored to the needs of small groups of instructors or interpreters who come to the institute seeking specific assistance. Ball also is creating a curriculum for a 15-week instruction period that will give college graduates intensive training.
"When they leave our program, they will be nationally certified and employable by whomever," she said.
Sorenson Communications has hired a number of leading sign language educators to lead its VRS Interpreting Institute, including:
Executive Director Carolyn Ball » director of the American Sign Language & Interpreting Program at William Woods University in Fulton, Mo.
Debbie Peterson » who comes from a deaf family in Alabama, and has taught around the country and has taught the use of international sign language.
Marla Broetz » who taught Salt Lake Community College, William Woods University and the National Technical Institute for the Deaf.
Annette Miner » who formerly taught full-time at Salt Lake Community College and coordinated its interpreter education program.
