A Message from Louis Provenzano, President & COO, Language Line Services

Friends and Colleagues,

Today, April 30th, marks an important day and yet another milestone in our industry's history.

We join colleagues and partner organizations from 30 states today as we begin more than 200 scheduled congressional meetings to advocate on behalf of medical interpreters!

The planning committee, which includes members of:

• The International Medical Interpreters Association (IMIA) and state representatives,
• The Medical Interpreter Network of Georgia (MING),
• The Nebraska Association for Translators and Interpreters (NATI),
• Area Health Education Centers (AHEC),
• Cardinal Point,
• Language Line Services,
• The Global Advisory Council and
• Some very dedicated interpreters...

...has been coordinating all of these congressional meetings and planning for the medical interpreters' first rally, ever!

You may be wondering what we will be talking about during these many meetings.

Topics to be discussed (and explained in this free informational flier distributed at the event) include:

• What types of reimbursement we are lobbying for - Medicare, Medicaid and Private Insurance
• What Medical Interpreters do exactly
• Healthcare Disparities and Language Access
• Benefits of National Certification for Patients, Providers, the Health Industry and Government
• Impact of Certified Medical Interpreters
• Benefits of Working with a Certified Medical Interpreter
• Consequences of Using an Unqualified Medical Interpreter
• Health Care Reform and our Next Steps

If you're reading this and will be in the DC area later today, come join the rally?

The rally begins at 4:00pm Eastern on the grounds of the Capitol, across from the Supreme Court Building and adjacent to the Russell Senate Office Building on Constitution Avenue.

If you are not in the area, you can still help. Read this message and email us about participating in the Advocacy Task Force for certification of medical interpreters at may1st_nmic_forum@yahoo.com

We've come a long way, but there is much work still to be done. I hope to see you at the rally, or to hear from you soon!

Best regards,

Louis

The United States is home to about 1.7 million Filipino immigrants, making them the second-largest immigrant group in the United States after Mexican immigrants.

The Filipino immigrant population grew rapidly during the 1970s and 1980s and has continued to grow (although at a slightly slower pace) since then. In addition, the United States is home to about 1.4 million native-born US citizens who claim Filipino ancestry.

Heavily concentrated in the western United States, the Filipino born account for almost half of all immigrants in Hawaii (for more information on immigrants by state, please see the ACS/Census Data tool on the MPI Data Hub).

Compared to other immigrant groups, Filipinos are better educated than the immigrant population overall, and Filipino immigrant women are more likely than other immigrant women to participate in the civilian labor force.

More to follow...

Editor's note: We keep coming back to the Migration Policy Institute (MPI) to provide you with the kind of information you will find interesting and useful as you serve limited English speakers where you work.

If you serve the Filipino American communities in your area, this extensive MPI series of articles provides a wealth of information including facts and stats:

• Nearly half of the Filipino born resided in California
• The Filipino born accounted for a large share of all immigrants in Western states
• Between 2000 and 2008, these three states saw the size of their Filipino immigrant population grow by 25,000 people or more
• More than one-third of Filipino immigrants resided in these three metropolitan areas
• Filipinos were two of every five immigrants in Honolulu. Other metropolitan areas with large groups of Filipinos are...
• Filipino immigrant women outnumbered men in 2008
• Less than one-third of Filipino immigrants in 2008 were limited English proficient
• And much, much more about Filipino Americans and their culture.

We hope you enjoy and gain from this very useful source of information.

Image provided by Beechwood Photography via Flickr.com

When was the last time this happened to you?

You're at a party with friends. The topic of politicians comes up and everyone is laughing. Laughing at all the clever barbs the group is tossing toward the local senator, congress member or governor.

And you just stand there listening and laughing, for some reason not being to think of a single thing to say.

Then, as you leave the party, walking out to your car, the light goes on and you think of what you wished you had said.

Believe it or not, there's no word or phrase in the English language for that feeling... and yet, in France, there is!

Esprit de l'escalier (French) is the term used for "a witty remark that occurs to you too late, literally on the way down the stairs".

There are likely thousands of such words in other languages that have no equal in English.

Here are 13 that perhaps you'll remember at your next social gathering. Perhaps not! :-)

"Word Cloud" image by Jason Morrison used by permission.

News from NBCMI

Industry-Leading Provider of Professional Testing and Certification Credentialing Services Releases Report Confirming National Certification Exams Meet Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing and the Institute for Credentialing Excellence

PR Log (Press Release) - Apr 28, 2010 - Washington DC - The National Board of Certification for Medical Interpreters has finalized the first-ever national certification program with the release of a Technical Standards Review and Validation Report by leading professional testing and certification credentialing services provider PSI.

The report, which can be downloaded at www.certifiedmedicalinterpreters.org, documents that the National Board's oral and written exams required to be credentialed as a "Certified Medical Interpreter" (CMI) in a specific language meet the standards for Educational and Psychological Testing (AERA, APA, NCME, 1999), and that the overall process of national medical interpreter certification adheres to the Institute for Credentialing Excellence's (ICE) best practice standards.

Read the rest of this news release here from the National Board for Certification of Medical Interpreters.

• Language Line Services' - Cross-Cultural Update for April 2010. Useful Cultural News, Tips and Timely Information


• "Non-English Speakers Struggle To Get Up To Speed As States Try To Keep Them Off Roads" - HuffingtonPost.com - By Louis Provenzano


• Language Line Services Expands Workforce. Following Recent New Product Launches, Leading Interpretation Company to Add More Than 1,000 New Positions to Meet Growing Client Demand for Language Solutions"


• Video Interpretation Takes Evolutionary Leap Forward Through Convergence of Technology and Human Capital | Language Line Services and NexTalk

Read more Language Line Services news here >>

Language Line Services, the leader in language interpretation, is seeking to increase its interpreter team in many languages including:

• Chru
• Edo
• Garre
• Kotokoli
• Kpelle
• Mam
• Mixteco
• Trique
• Punu
• Putian
• Sango
• Sinhalese
• Uzbeq*

An exciting new opportunity is available to experienced interpreters living in the Los Angeles area. Interpreters will now be able to do both on-site, face-to-face interpreting as well as over-the-phone interpreting in the following languages: Spanish, Mandarin, Cantonese, Vietnamese, Korean, Russian, Farsi, Armenian, and Japanese.

And, finally, among non-interpreter positions, here is a selection for which we are interviewing:

• Account Manager
• Collections Specialist
• Customer Contract Salesforce Administrator
• Interpreter Response Center Specialist
• Payroll Specialist
• Business Development Executive
• Response Center Specialist
• Graphic Designer/Production Artist, and
• Several other positions

For non-interpreter positions, please apply at: www.languageline.com/careers. Click on "Apply Today" under "Corporate Careers" and follow the directions to add your profile.

EEO/AA Employer.

* Some positions may have been filled by the time you apply. However, new positions open every week.

Visit our Career Center here >>

The girl, from the southern town of Knin, had only just started studying German at school and had been reading German books and watching German TV to become better, but was by no means fluent, according to her parents.

Since waking up from her 24 hour coma however, she has been unable to speak Croatian, but is able to communicate perfectly in German.

Doctors at Split's KB Hospital claim that the case is so unusual, various experts have examined the girl as they try to find out what triggered the change.

Hospital director Dujomir Marasovic said: "You never know when recovering from such a trauma how the brain will react. Obviously we have some theories although at the moment we are limited in what we can say because we have to respect the privacy of the patient."

Read the rest of this Telegraph.co.uk article... and 29 reader comments... here.

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