Translation of documents, interpretation and related communication tools are a necessary part of our culture, not a luxury, and not only for the global businesses. And while some school districts claim that providing translations of documents for parents is codling immigrants, this school district in Utah actually taking that a few step further by creating their own department of translation. Read more.

With 74 different languages spoken by families in the Granite School District, communicating with parents may take more than just sending a note or a phone call home.
“[Its] an absolutely important role for our district to get translation and interpreting services centralized,” said Rob Averett, district director of elementary school services.

This summer Granite added the Translation and Interpreting Department to offer support services for parents, students and district staff.

Before the addition, schools had to find their own interpreters and translation services. “We saw the need for it and recognized the need to reach out to the community,” Everett said.

…Prodan said one of the goals is to make sure parents are well-informed and for them to feel engaged in their child’s education.

“If we connect with the parents a lot better, we can get better results,” Prodan said. “This program really serves the community. . . . I’ve seen the good results that come out of it.”

Staff can send written work for translation to the office to provide information to those parents who have limited English skills.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 9th, 2007 at 10:40 pm and is filed under Culture. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.