We are passing on this message from Susanne van Eyl, Chair of the Mentoring Committee, on the new ATA mentoring program.
Hi everyone:
I wanted to take a moment to invite all interested members to consider the new mentoring program of ATA. We’ve used Courtney Searls-Ridge’s long-standing program and made changes and updates to find new ways to learn from and support each other.
The biggest change is that all mentor/mentee pairs are slated to start and end their work at the same time each year: in mid-April. This is designed to build a strong community for mentees, many of whom are new members who don’t have many contacts within the association and/or industry.
The program will focus on helping with the business side of translation and interpreting which means that all mentees need to have a proven record of knowing their craft. Those who are very new to the industry will have a sample translation evaluated by a translation company of their choice. This is the only expense they will incur. Since many mentors may want to introduce their mentees to clients and contacts, knowing that the mentee is a good translator will give them the confidence to do so. Matching languages is not a priority, instead we will focus on matching people according to the specific needs of a mentee and the business skills of a mentor.
A few mentee/mentor teams are already working, and this is what one mentor wrote to me yesterday: “We are getting along very well and I think we are both profiting from the relationship.” This team works in different languages and it seems that they have plenty to talk about.
If this program is of interest to you, please write to mentoring@atanet.org and include your resume and a brief statement of what you are hoping to achieve. Further information can be found here:
We look forward to working with you.
Susanne
