DOE To Expand Translations Unit
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The Department of Education will spend an extra $7.5 million starting in September to expand its year-old unit for translations and interpretation, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein announced yesterday.
The department pledged to provide over-the-phone interpretations to parents who speak Spanish, Bengali, Urdu, and about 180 other languages. Members of the expanded translation unit will also translate key documents and provide interpretations at education events. About $5.3 million of the total translations budget will pay for the central translation unit at Tweed while $4.9 million will be sent to schools and regions to support translation services. The bill will be paid with reallocated grant money.
“Parental engagement is essential to our children’s success in school,” Mr. Klein said. “We have identified significant additional funding to improve our schools’ communication with non-English-speaking parents and ensure that a language barrier does not stand in the way of our parents’ ability to be involved in their children’s education.”
The chairwoman of the City Council’s Committee on Education, Eva Moskowitz, who is holding a hearing this morning on translation, said she is “delighted” the department is responding to her hearing schedule with changes in policy.
She said she wants to find out today if documents that are written in “gibberish in English” will be equally difficult to understand when translated for non-English-speaking parents. She also said she wants to find out which documents will be translated and exactly how the $7.5 million will be spent.
According to information provided to the council by the department, there are 13 public schools at which 10% or more of the parents speak a language other than one of the top 10.
In related news, hundreds of parents who are not proficient in English are to gather at Pace University this weekend to learn from the education department how to navigate the school system. Sessions will include information about parents’ rights under the No Child Left Behind Act, summer options available to English-language learners, admission to high schools, and health services.
