Tucked in the Southwestern edge of Orlando, Florida lies a place that is truly unique. A place whose sole purpose is to make the dreams of children with life-threatening illnesses come true. Give Kids the World village is a beautiful, 84-acre resort that is specifically designed to accommodate any and every need of wish families who choose to travel to Orlando and visit the many theme parks in the area.
The volunteers and workers spend countless hours managing every single detail of each child’s magical trip, ensuring that nothing but fun awaits them on their arrival. For families with language barriers, there are even more details to get just right; most importantly, finding a quality, service-oriented interpreter to help the family interact with their exciting new environment with ease.
LTC is happy to be able to fill this need for deserving families. To ensure that each interpreter who works in such a special environment is well equipped for the job, LTC began partnering with Give Kids the World to provide a comprehensive training program. LTC’s own interpreter training guru, Liz Essary, travelled this week to Florida to do just that.
Because the mission of Give Kids the World is customer-focused and service-oriented, it was extremely important to find interpreters who would make the family’s experience a priority. “We look for people who have a can-do attitude and are flexible,” said Liz on recruiting interpreters. “I think there is an argument to be made that interpreters in general have to be customer service oriented because we’re doing so much one-on-one work with people, but it becomes especially important in this atmosphere.”
Once skilled, customer service minded interpreters are found, Liz then offers a training program that not only covers the essentials of interpreter foundations and ethics, but also delves into topics that are especially important in this unique environment.
The style of interpreting provided to Give Kids families is what is known as “liaison interpreting”. The interpreter stays with the family through all of their adventures at the theme parks and at the resort campus. While the role of an interpreter is the same in this environment as in any other, complexities can arise. For example, an interpreter might be told something that is important to the family’s experience at the park at a time when there is no one to interpret the information to. Liz provides the interpreter with the knowledge of how to handle these scenarios professionally.
Other topics that Liz covers in her training include confidentiality requirements, self-care and practices related to interpreting for children. To ensure that the family’s privacy is protected, LTC requires all interpreters to follow strict confidentiality guidelines. The training will also address special considerations when interpreting for children, such as the confusing nature of an interpreter’s use of the first person. “Normally in an interpreted encounter, the interpreter is speaking in first person. But there is an exception to that rule when we work with kids or anyone who cognitively cannot understand the interpreted encounter, in as much as, the interpreter is interpreting but the message is not actually coming from the interpreter,” said Liz. To avoid confusion, interpreters are instructed to utilize indirect or third person speech.
The opportunity to work with these families is a very special experience. LTC looks forward to continuing our partnership with such a wonderful organization, and continuing to provide qualified and caring interpreters for each and every family who needs one.
-Casey Buchanan, Marketing Coordinator
