News

Dear Ross. Many thanks for your willingness to engage with CISLI, interpreters and Deaf people as a result of the discussions over the last few days. It is encouraging to see your interest in the status of ISL and the difficulties Deaf people face as a result of its non-recognition. We are always here if you need to clarify anything on this front. It is especially welcome that you intend to have a professional interpreter at your next show – we are sure Deaf audience members will love it. We are happy to point the way to bodies like the Irish Deaf Society, who will be able to provide you with information and awareness about Deaf people and their culture. We do appreciate your response and thank you for your prompt and polite manner in talking to us.

 

Hello all,

A slightly belated Happy New Year from the CISLI Committee! We hope you had a relaxing holiday period and that the New Year isn’t too busy so far!

January has already seen very encouraging moves on the Irish Sign Language Bill, moving to Committee stage in the Seanad very soon, with the IDS asking Deaf people to send submissions. We have also been urging CISLI members to give us feedback and their own thoughts on the Bill’s provisions on interpreting services. This is a landmark piece of potential legislation, and will affect every interpreter if it is passed.

To this end, we met with the IDS, SLIS, and the Centre for Deaf Studies on 20 January, and we began to explore the common ground the four organisations have on recognition of ISL and other related issues. CISLI was careful to stress the need for

• strong interpreter representation in decision-making at any interpreter registration body proposed
• the importance of assessment of interpreters for higher-level domains being included eventually into any registration programme
• We also made clear that the issues go beyond just having a large enough pool of interpreters. How interpreting work is procured, supplied, structured, allocated and paid for, are also vital components of a stable interpreting profession, and cannot be ignored in the event of any recognition of ISL.

Our Chairperson also met with John Stewart of SLIS on the 10th January to further discuss SLIS’ proposed Voluntary Registration for interpreters, as well as the CDS Report commissioned by SLIS and in relation to the registration processes for interpreters in other countries. CISLI have been clear in pointing out the need for any such registration to function across all agencies, for registrants to be members of professional associations like CISLI, and other key points.

These are rapid developments on interpreter registration, by well-funded bodies with far above the operational capacity of CISLI. This means that the future of the currently defunct Board of Evaluators of Interpreting (BEI) project may need to be considered carefully by CISLI. However, CISLI’s core principles attached to that project will remain at the heart of the organisation, even if the concrete form in which those principles eventually take shape may not be the exact body we previously envisaged. These principles include:

• partnership with the Irish Deaf Society in any new interpreting policy ventures
  assessment for higher level interpreting domains
• full consultation with interpreters before any new registration or licensing system is begun
• the importance of structured professional mentoring for new interpreters
• a robust and transparent mechanism for handling grievances in relation to interpreting assignments
• international cooperation and following documented best practice
• an active and constructive relationship with the Centre for Deaf Studies

We are currently developing a CISLI Strategy, an important document that will set out our core beliefs, aims and objectives for the short and medium term. More on this as it develops.

We have been shocked – but not entirely surprised – at the results of recent research into the income of interpreters. Seeing the average full-time income of a sign language interpreter just marginally above the average starting salary of an Irish graduate is sobering. This reflects not just the lack of value society places on professional interpreting, but also the lack of value they place in Irish Sign Language, and indeed, communication between Deaf and hearing people. If we cannot provide a stable, well-paid career for sign language professionals – Deaf and hearing – how can we expect people to stay interpreters? CISLI will continue to campaign for those working as interpreters, and do our utmost to help increase retention of people in the field. We will seek improved working conditions on all fronts so that interpreters are motivated to stay in the profession as long as they can.

We would just like to take the opportunity to thank Senan Dunne, IDS representative, for his work with CISLI. He is stepping down from the position. Senan’s work for CISLI has been hugely valuable and he will be missed. We will let you know of the two new IDS reps on CISLI as soon as we can.

We have also had a busy year with our Sub-Committees. Take a look!

Occupational Health and Safety Sub-Committee: The Occupational Health & Safety (OHS) Committee plan to draw up a Health & Safety Policy and to obtain an industry standard. From the past number of months, the subcommittee has gathered information from other established organizations around the world to identify what health and safety standards are present in other countries. Our research aims to see what are the standard practices for interpreters’ signing duration and what adequate breaks are provided. Incorporating all of this information the OHS committee will draw up a Health & Safety policy document on behalf of CISLI, to work towards developing an industry standard in Ireland with the hope that interpreting agencies in Ireland would abide by the same standards. Additionally, we are currently consulting with physical therapist Rory O’ Donnell who is assisting in researching repetitive strain injury (RSI). This will be combined with CISLI’s policy document. While this document is focus on interpreting standards, the importance of ‘eye breaks’ for Deaf people must also be taken into consideration. We are hoping to have the draft document ready in the coming month, which will be shared with the general public. Anthony Claffey

Training Sub-Committee: In the past 6 months, we have organised two events, one a workshop and the other an evening information session (followed by a social gathering). Both events were well attended by both active and associate members. As per our terms of reference the event in October was held outside of Dublin and was facilitated in the Deaf Centre in Limerick. The training was for Deaf and Hearing Interpreters and focused on how to best work together. Led by Teresa Lynch and Frankie Berry, participants (29 in total) were first introduced to Teresa’s thesis research and then the afternoon was spent in a very interactive role play scenario. Many people who work in roles not traditionally assumed to be Deaf Interpreting roles were invited to join us on the day and became associate members. They all realised that while they do not view themselves as Deaf Interpreters in their full time work they are indeed acting in an Interpreting capacity at times and would benefit from attending more training in the future. The feedback from the event overall was very positive, members felt that the introduction to Deafhood given by Teresa was fascinating and the afternoon role plays were beneficial for both the experienced and inexperienced alike.

The second event was held in the CDS in December. It was and quick fire information session with two presenters. We are hoping these information sessions will become a bi-monthly event. The aim is to update members on any relevant research or findings that are relevant to the profession. Again this event was very well attended (approx 25-30 attendees). Caroline McGrotty presented on her thesis research in relation to Deaf people’s experience of using and accessing interpreters in 3rd Level education. Dr John Bosco Conama then followed with a presentation on the ISL recognition bill and what it may mean for interpreters. Both presentations were well received and members felt the value in having these quick-fire information sessions to keep them up to date with developments in both our profession and the community we work with. Following on from that the CISLI committee organised a pre-Christmas / December social night which was also well attended.

At the end of 2016 beginning of 2017 unfortunately two of our committee had to step down. Cormac and Mary both gave us valuable insight and support as part of the team and they will be missed greatly. As the committee is now made up of 4 but only 2 being active members we are hoping to recruits one more person to join us and help us to shape a valuable 2017 for all the members. It is envisaged that we will have our next information evening in February followed by a training event in March which will coincide with the CISLI GM. We are currently consulting with members to ascertain their training needs and also their areas of interest for the evening sessions. Lisa Harvey

Grievance Procedure Research Sub-Committee: The CISLI committee identified a need to investigate the process of some type of complaint procedure and in order to accomplish that they asked for a research sub-committee to be set up. There are two CISLI committee members on the sub-committee (Pauline Mc Mahon and Frankie Berry), as well an active member (Lisa Harvey), and two outside consultants (Joanne Chester and Caroline Mc Grotty) on the sub-committee. The subcommittee is not there for setting up a complaints procedure but rather it is to investigate what is best practice worldwide, to correlate that information and to hand that back to the CISLI committee. In gathering that information, local (Irish), sign and spoken language agencies will be contacted and asked for their company’s grievance/complaints procedure. The sub-committee had their first meeting just before Christmas to set out a plan of action and to agree on Terms of Reference. The sub-committee will meet again in February/March 2017. All members of the committee work full time and are involved in many other projects and committees for both personal and connected to work. This will not be a quick process but is on the way. Pauline McMahon

We have a General Meeting for all CISLI members in Dublin on Thursday evening 23 March, and we hope to have a training event in Dublin that same week – possibly Saturday. Please watch this space. Keep an eye on your email, the CISLI Facebook page, our website, and the ISL interpreter WhatsApp group for more information!

Regards

_____________
Committee
Council of Sign Language Interpreters

CISLI’s Training Sub-Committee would like 5 minutes of your time… 

The survey can be found HERE: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/FMYSGV5 

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CISLI were extremely fortunate to have Caroline McGrotty and Dr John Bosco Conama present to over 30 of our members in the Centre for Deaf Studies, Dublin, on the 13th December.

Caroline McGrotty gave a fascinating presentation on her research on third-level education interpreting, which featured discussion of the importance of trust, the relationship between Deaf student and interpreter, the role of the disability officer, and much more.

Dr Conama presented on the ISL Bill, currently before Seanad Éireann, and how its provisions would affect interpreters. He explored the various provisions in the Bill around registration, a possible ‘voucher’ system, sanctions for unregistered interpreters, and much more.

Heartfelt thanks to Dr Conama and Ms McGrotty, and also to the Centre for Deaf Studies for allowing us to use their room.

Afterwards, we headed to the nearby Porterhouse where we indulged in a little festive revelry!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all CISLI members!

Saturday saw a highly successful training day for CISLI in Limerick, where a large group of Deaf and hearing interpreters and trainees took part in the ‘Working with Deaf Interpreters’ training session, delivered by Teresa Lynch and Frankie Berry.

The session began with an exploration of Deafhood and colonialism as it related to the Deaf community, before linking in to Teresa Lynch’s own research into Deaf interpreting. She told us that Deaf interpreting for many Deaf people is an activity that has been happening for years – many Deaf people have been interpreting since childhood but not known this was the term for it!

Following lunch, four roleplays were held, to help us understand the complexities of Deaf-hearing interpreting team dynamics in medical, legal, mental health and conference settings. These really brought home the range of work that Deaf interpreters do.

After the training, a General Meeting was held with members of CISLI old and new, with our Chairperson, Cormac Leonard, updating members on national developments and local members discussing concerns.

Many thanks to all who attended both events! We hope to have another training day in Dublin in February / March.

In this clip our Committee members Amanda Mohan and Ciara Grant give a short report on their visit to Brussels for the EU Parliament’s Multilingualism conference – featuring over 140 interpreters working at the same venue!

A short video that we’ve produced to celebrate ISL awareness week. Interpreters Deaf and hearing, students and professionals, declaring their love for Irish Sign Language.

Well, we have certainly had a busy first couple of months as a Committee!

• Hot on the heels of our first Committee meeting in July, we promptly set up two new SubCommittees. Firstly, we have a SubCommittee looking at Occupational Health and Safety; this group will be looking at working conditions and physical risks for interpreters and will develop a draft Policy for CISLI.

• We have also formed a group to look at the creation of a Grievance / Dispute policy. This SubCommittee is strictly in the researching phase at the moment, gathering best practice from other comparable countries. More news on these new SubCommittees soon, as well as updates to existing Sub Committees.

• We have a great October training session lined up – Teresa Lynch and Frankie Berry will deliver a session for CISLI members on Working with Deaf Interpreters on Sat 22 October in Limerick. This will be followed by a General Meeting of CISLI members.

• The Training Sub-Committee also plans to hold a series of talks in Dublin on midweek evenings on various interpreting – related topics – free for members. Again watch this space!

• We have also been introducing ourselves to the many agencies that provide sign language interpreting services. The range of such organisations is important for us to keep abreast of. New companies entering the industry have received introductory letters from us, and we hope to have face to face meetings through the year with agencies and develop good working relationships with them.

• Another change we have made is to the Student Representative position on the Committee. We feel that a reconfiguring of the role should take place to maximise the position’s usefulness. Therefore we have decided that Ciara Grant, our current Student Representative, will act as a New Member Liaison until the upcoming AGM. She will become a full voting member of the Committee and focus solely on the needs and queries of both CDS students and newly-qualified interpreters. The Committee will propose a Motion to make the corresponding changes to the Constitution next year.

We are committed in 2016/7 to work on such matters of national importance – liasing with agencies, old and new; exploring possibilities around our own grievance procedure linked to our Code of Ethics; health and safety and good conditions for interpreters; and discussion with other parties about licensing and/or registration of interpreters post-qualification.

Yet this national focus, our small size, tiny budget and voluntary nature means that prioritisation must occur. CISLI regrets that it was unable to attend this year’s efsli AGM. We had sent out informal apologies previously to efsli, and are disappointed that once again, the limited finances of CISLI and the very busy professional and personal lives of our volunteer Committee did not permit attendance. We are also confirming that CISLI will have representation in 2017 for efsli in France, as well as other interpreter related events through the coming year.

But none of the goals and campaigns we wish to work on, for all of us, can be achieved without member support. Our paid membership numbers are currently the lowest on record, however. Without members, CISLI cannot represent interpreters. We cannot plan.We cannot advise. We cannot work on those areas that interpreters are now vocally insisting are vital to work on. We need people to join the organisation. We need your help.

To this end, we are offering interpreters the chance to join as Active members between NOW and the 23rd October, and you will become fully paid members right up until the end of 2017. This represents an extra third of a year membership for the same price.

We encourage you to come to our training events, meetings, and get involved with our Sub-Committees. Let us know how we can help you. Let us know where we are falling down. Let us be stronger together, so that we can represent this growing profession, support each other, and move forward with the Deaf community to a better future for all of us.

Regards

CISLI Committee

Join as a Member!

2016 Membership Form for CISLI – CLICK HERE

Warm greetings to all from the newly elected CISLI Committee!

As Chairperson I would like to thank my fellow CISLI members for their support. I will do my utmost in the coming years to help grow the profession, build bridges between interpreters and the Deaf community and the wider world, and to build up solidarity amongst interpreters themselves. This, I believe, is central to moving forward with interpreting in this country. I have seen much to encourage us over the last few years in this regard.

Yet today in 2016, five years after the Irish interpreting profession re-established itself in the form of CISLI, problems remain, and new issues abound. As access becomes less of a right and more a commodity, an ever-tighter State focus on ‘value for money’ shifts the ground under our feet. New agencies – providing both spoken and sign language interpreting services – proliferate. Major interpreting contracts in colleges, hospitals, courts administration, and other public services such as the Garda Síochána, are snapped up and agreed on – without any user or practitioner involvement. Deaf people and interpreters are often bewildered at the rapid pace of this change; it often seems like those who are most likely to control provision of sign language interpreting services are the least likely to understand the unique nature of interpreting and the Deaf community.

Interpreting remains a job without a clear career path. Interpreters’ fees, having not ‘officially’ been raised for many years, are now under downward pressure, which is often perceived as a ‘race to the bottom’. Terms and conditions for interpreters – especially in relation to team working and breaks – are continually under threat. We are often told of the shortage of interpreters – but we still struggle with a sharp decline of work in the summer time, and we still hear of colleagues for whom interpreting alone cannot pay the bills. Indeed, many valued colleagues have recently left the profession because it could not provide a steady income.

For the Deaf community, there are more interpreters, but issues of quality still rankle. While the vast majority of practitioners possess a third level qualification, and new entrants to the Centre for Deaf Studies benefit from a four-year degree programme, the profile of entrants has shifted; prior knowledge of ISL and the Deaf community is more often the exception than the rule. The Deaf community have been steadfast in insisting that interpreters, in their training and as part of their profession, develop stronger links with the Deaf community; but, as in other countries, these links are often weak or absent. Agency complaints procedures are unclear and often seem ineffective, and there is still no statutory or even voluntary form of registration of interpreters.

What can we do? CISLI can play a huge part in tackling these issues. We need a strong body that represents interpreters. We are few in number and diverse in opinion. But we can focus on what is common amongst us all, and strive to put in place for Irish Sign Language interpreting those features and systems considered mandatory in other jurisdictions. It will not be easy. It will take work. But it is work that needs to be done.

In CISLI we intend to focus firstly on driving this energy by focusing on networking for interpreters. Our recent AGM saw us amend our Constitution, and now CISLI will have two Ordinary Members’ Meetings per year (one outside Dublin) as well as the AGM. We will also work on information gathering to make sure we have an accurate picture of interpreting agency provision around the country, and are proactive in pushing for appropriate terms and conditions for interpreters – regardless of agency.

We will also begin to look at wider issues of crucial importance to our relationship with the Deaf community. It is a desire of mine as Chairperson to examine the issue of complaints procedures. Many Deaf people are feeling poorly served by the existing complaints procedures of agencies. CISLI’s founding documents envisage us having a role in dispute resolution; we need to decide whether to excise these elements of our foundational documents, or to embrace them and develop a role in this area. It makes no sense to me for CISLI to have zero involvement in investigating alleged breaches of the CISLI Code of Ethics.

I feel we must also begin to proactively examine the area of licensing / registration of interpreting practitioners. No profession assumes that practitioners will remain at the same level of skill after qualification, without some form of structured CPD or further assessment of skills. We must grasp that receiving our qualification is the beginning, and not the end, of our learning. This has historically been a deeply controversial topic for interpreters, but we must respect the fact that Deaf people want, and deserve, a system of safeguarding to make sure the practitioners they work with have the capability to do the job.

None of these issues will be looked at without intense discussion with and between CISLI members. It is our hope that the majority of practising interpreters will join CISLI this coming year. We want a membership that is supporting and supported. We need a profession that is diverse yet united. And we want to widen and deepen our relationship with the Deaf community – without whom none of us would be where we are today.

Please let us know any thoughts or opinions you may have on our profession, in English or ISL. We look forward to working with you all.

Regards

• Cormac Leonard, Chairperson
• Frankie Berry, Vice Chair
• Pauline McMahon, Secretary
• Imelda Gibbons, Treasurer
• Anthony Claffey, Ordinary Member
• Amanda Mohan, Ordinary Member
• Ciara Grant, Student Representative
• Senan Dunne, IDS Representative

Council of Irish Sign Language Interpreters (CISLI)
http://www.cisli.ie
cisli.ireland@gmail.com