I have been doing this for over 36 years. It is the one thing I have been able to do consistently for such a long time. I am a judiciary interpreter, and the bulk of my work throughout my entire career has been with the...

Originally published in January 2015, this post remains relevant. Please enjoy. On this blog, we dedicate a great deal of time and effort to the profession of interpreting for the courts. We tell stories, share experiences, propose new ideas, and issue calls to action. This week,...

I was talking to a colleague friend of mine recently when she mentioned she had to deliver a translation but had to get it notarized first. My brain immediately went in two different directions: (1) I know this is a fairly common practice among translators...

I was at the annual conference of the Texas Association of Judiciary Interpreters and Translators  (TAJIT) in Austin this past weekend, and was spellbound by every presenter, strongly motivated to learn new things from all of them and was even challenged to think out of...

Planning is fun. Then, life happens I had planned on writing about my experience in the Southern District of Texas, McAllen Division, interpreting for the “tsunami” of misdemeanor illegal entry cases, maybe comparing it to my experience in the District of Puerto Rico interpreting for the...

Team interpreting* is a process. There is no one single way to work as part of a team. There is no formula you can apply that will make it run on wheels every time. It is all going to depend on the chemistry between the...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US-Courts-AdministrativeOffice-Seal.svg The Administrative Office of the United States Courts (AO) is an administrative agency that is the central support entity for the judicial branch providing a wide range of administrative, legal, financial, management, program, and information technology services to the federal courts. https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/administrative_office_of_the_united_states_courts When I became a...

Growing pains in a profession, or an association, can manifest themselves in many ways. We at NAJIT seem to be experiencing one of those right now on the question of professional fees. When can we talk about them? With whom can we discuss and share...

- by Janis Palma © 2018 I have always felt a special thrill when I “discover” something I did not know before. I’m pretty sure my brain is releasing endorphins every time I research something, because I just want to keep digging! The more I find...

By Janis Palma ©2017 Lately I’ve been asked a lot about test-taking “tips”. Of course, the federal certification exam for judiciary interpreters was recently administered, so it’s at the forefront of many certification candidates’ minds. However, rather than suggesting some test-taking “tips”, I’d like to offer...