NORTHRIDGE : CSUN Sign Language Program Gets Grants

A unique program to train sign language interpreters at Cal State Northridge has been awarded $125,000 in federal grants in the final year of a five-year program that uses mentorships to boost the skill level of trainees.

Unlike other training programs that rely on workshops and classroom lessons to teach how to interpret for the hearing-impaired, the Regional Interpreter Training Consortium, housed in the deaf studies program at CSUN, pairs trainees with professional mentors.

People with hearing impairments use interpreters in numerous situations, from court appearances to doctors’ appointments, from work to school to the opera.

In the last two decades, Tracy Clark, program coordinator for the center, which is one of 10 regional training centers in the United States, said the need for skilled sign language interpreters has increased markedly.

A federal act in the 1970s mainstreamed students with hearing impairments into elementary and secondary schools, and the 1990 Americans With Disabilities Act guaranteed equal opportunity for individuals with disabilities.

“In the past few years there has been a shortage of interpreters and a shortage of qualified interpreters,” Clark said.

More than 200 students have been trained in the first four years of the CSUN program, and regional centers elsewhere in the country have already begun to copy the program, Clark said.