UMTIA – Upper Midwest Translators and Interpreters Association

Features

UMTIA is a chapter of the American Translators Association. It’s core membership is based in Minnesota, but it also represents areas of Wisconsin, Iowa, South Dakota, and North Dakota. It seeks to emulate in the fields of spoken language interpreting and translating the accomplishments of the Registry of Interpreters for the Deaf (http://www.rid.org), in education, standards, and excellence in the field of ASL interpreting.
UMTIA is dedicated to improving language access and the quality of spoken language services by providing educational opportunities for spoken language interpreters and translators, by supporting the development of qualifications and regulatory practices for the field, helping to create training standards and best practices, by bringing together government and industry leaders through the Interpreting Stakeholder Group (ISG), an outreach committee of UMTIA, and through language development activities in new immigrant langauges, especially languages of lesser diffusion,
UMTIA’s formation began in 2002 when Deb Kramasz brought together many area translators to create a local venue for offering the ATA translators certification exam and to organize local educational opportunities for translators and interpreters. The group formalized the organization as a chapter of the ATA in 2004. The first board of directors consisted of Deb Kramasz, Larry Bogoslow, Nadia Smith, Giselle Niles, and Gail Tanaka.
UMTIA also provides expertise to legislators and industry leaders working on language access policy. Recently, UMTIA has been contacted to provide expertise and information on lessons learned to the New York mayor’s office which has recently adopted a langauge access policy, and to the Washington State Coalition for Language Access. Currently, the ISG hosts bi-monthly meetings on the second and fourth Thursdays of the month with the Minnesota Department of Health to develop the necessary expertise to create a roster of medical interpreters at MDH and to design a plan for a registry of spoken language interpreters in Minnesota.

Benefits

Individual members, or representatives of institutional and corporate members have the right to: attend any membership meetings; receive regular publications; serve on all committees of the Association; attend association-sponsored events at a reduced fee; and have access to any
other member services that the Executive Committee puts into effect.
b) Student members pay reduced dues and have all the rights and privileges of individual members except the right to have contact information listed in the membership directory and the right to serve on the Executive Committee or other Governance Committees. Student members may serve on non-governance committees and belong to special interest groups.