Project CLIMB:
Shifting Perspectives in Interpreter Education Project CLIMB: Cultivating Legal Interpreters from Minority Backgrounds was established to increase the quantity and quality of interpreters of color, Deaf and Coda interpreters with specialization in legal interpreting. Project CLIMB was a $2M, five-year grant (#H160D160001) awarded by the U.S. Department of Education, Rehabilitation Services Administration, to the University of Northern Colorado’s (UNC) American Sign Language-English Interpretation BA program between 2017 - 2021. UNC also contributed more than $185,000 to this project.The Project CLIMB leadership team consisted of Dr. Leilani Johnson (CO), Ms. Schawn Hardesty (WA), Ms. Kelly Decker (VT), Dr. Amy Williamson (VT), and Ms. Erica West-Oyedele (CA). The contents shared here are part of a larger comprehensive compilation of the materials produced and distributed by Project CLIMB.
Individuals within deaf communities have shared experiences of misunderstandings, injustices, and lack of access related to the legal system (Castelle, 2003). Helping Educate to Advance the Rights of the Deaf (HEARD), a nonprofit organization that promotes equal access to the legal system for individuals who are deaf or have a disability, reports that discrimination and racial disparities persist at every stage of the U.S. criminal justice system, from policing to trial to sentencing. There is no, nor has there ever been, a program or process designed to strategically meet the interpreting needs of deaf individuals of color as they interface with various aspects of the legal system. Per the Registry of Interpreters for the Deaf, Inc (RID) 2019 Annual Report, of the 14,452 members, 1,689 (11.6%) self-identify as Black/African American, Asian American/Pacific Islander, American Indian, or Hispanic/Latinx (RID, 2020). Such statistics exemplify the fact that there is a severe shortage of sign language interpreters of color available to meet the needs of this population, whether they be victims, witnesses, or defendants, during each stage of the criminal legal process. Further, due to the shortage of in-group interpreters, the needs of deaf individuals of color are not being adequately addressed within the civil legal system. Creating “linguistic presence” in a court of law requires the availability of competent legal interpreters (de Jongh, 2008). A second group of underrepresented individuals (deaf or non-deaf) in the current workforce are those who were raised by at least one signing, deaf parent. Having access to a minority language (a signed language) at home that is not used in the larger community of spoken language users categorizes these individuals as heritage language users of signed language. Heritage signers who hear are also referred to as Codas and often acquire ASL with varying fluency from their parent(s) and the deaf communities with whom they are associated. This language exposure, coupled with an intimate familiarity with various deaf communities can bring significant experience and skill to the profession of interpreting. The National Interpreter Education Center’s (NCIEC) 2014 Practitioner Survey (Cogen & Cokely, 2015) reveals that only 9% of the respondents identified themselves as having been deaf-parented. This statistic is coupled with the growing demand for Deaf interpreters. In the NIEC 2015 Trends Report, 61% of service providers reported an increase in the demand for the services of Deaf interpreters, and 81% reported difficulty in finding qualified Deaf interpreters (Cogen & Cokely, 2015). The report goes on to provide insight into why the use of interpreters who come from deaf communities are in such demand. According to 69% of the survey respondents, Deaf interpreters have proven to be very adept at achieving deeper levels of meaning while interpreting through their use of a broader variety of targeted communication strategies and interventions. In legal settings where the rights, freedoms, safety, and resources of deaf individuals are at risk, the availability of the ex 20
