About Us!

UMTIA is a chapter of the American Translators Association. It's core membership is based in Minnesota, but it also represents areas of Wisconsin, Iowa, South Dakota, and North Dakota. UMTIA seeks to emulate in the fields of spoken language interpreting and translating the accomplishments of the Registry of Interpreters (http://www.rid.org), in education, standards, and excellence in the field of ASL interpreting.

UMTIA is dedicated to improving language access and the quality of spoken language services by providing educational opportunities for spoken language interpreters and translators, by supporting the development of qualifications and regulatory practices for the field, helping to create training standards and best practices, by bringing together government and industry leaders through the Interpreting Stakeholder Group (ISG), an outreach committee of UMTIA, and through language development activities in new immigrant langauges, especially languages of lesser diffusion,

UMTIA's formation began in 2002 when Deb Kramasz brought together many area translators to create a local venue for offering the ATA translators certification exam and to organize local educational opportunities for translators and interpreters. The group formalized the organization as a chapter of the ATA in 2004. The first board of directors consisted of Deb Kramasz, Larry Bogoslow, Nadia Smith, Giselle Niles, and Gail Tanaka.

At the 2003 UMTIA conference, 30 area interpreting stakeholders met and formed an ad hoc committee of UMTIA, the Interpreting Stakeholder Group (ISG). The ISG, now an outreach committee bringing together industry and government leaders, meets on the third Friday of each month from 10-12 at the UCare office building on Stinson Blvd.

In 2008 UMTIA formalized its committee structure, creating four types of committees: Regulatory Committees which will focus on standards of practice; Outreach Committees, such as the ISG; Special Interest Groups which bring together people with interests or experience in similar domains and which identify needs that impact language access or the ability of members to provide quality interpreting or translation services, and develop appropriate continuing education opportunities for the community; and General Committees.

UMTIA's energy comes from its committees who plan talks and trainings, and identify needs in the field, such as the development of glossaries in languages of lesser diffusion, or Best Practice Guidelines for Hiring Interpreters in Rural Settings.

UMTIA also provides expertise to legislators and industry leaders working on language access policy. Recently, UMTIA has been contacted to provide expertise and information on lessons learned to the New York mayor's office which has recently adopted a langauge access policy, and to the Washington State Coalition for Language Access. Currently, the ISG hosts bi-monthly meetings on the second and fourth Thursdays of the month with the Minnesota Department of Health to develop the necessary expertise to create a roster of medical interpreters at MDH and to design a plan for a registry of spoken language interpreters in Minnesota.

UMTIA By-laws

Barriers to better language access and higher quality spoken language interpreting and translating in all languages which we are trying to overcome:

1. Lack of training opportunities, especially in rural communities with food processing plants;
   
   
2. Insufficient knowledge of who is interpreting in order to reach them with training opportunities;
   
   
3. Lack of qualified trainers;
   
   
4. Lack of standardized training standards;
   
   
5. Lack of standardized curriculum;
   
   
6. Lack of training materials in languages of lesser diffusion, such as Somali, Hmong, Nuer, Oromo, Dinka;
   
   
7. Lack of technical glossaries in languages of lesser diffusion, such as Somali, Hmong, Nuer, Oromo, Dinka;
   
   
8. Lack of standardized exams to test proficiency of interpreters;
   
   
9. Lack of financial resources in new immigrant communities to support the education of interpreters in their languages;
   
   
10. Misperceptions on the part of employers regarding the skills needed by interpreters and the risks and consequences of misinterpretation;
    
    
11. Lack of licensing or registry requirements;
    
    
12. Lack of professional development opportunities to support a licensing system;
    
    
13. Lack of data regarding what languages are spoken in any particular geographic area;
    
    
14. Lack of data regarding what languages are being interpreted and how frequently.