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This comment is in regards to the member opinion written above by Ted Wozniak.
I read the same documents that Ted referenced, and I came to a different conclusion when I analyzed everything in its entirety. I put time into writing what I intended to be respectful articles in which I shared serious unanswered concerns (in my article above and in the January Chronicle). While I appreciate that Ted agreed that some of the questions and arguments against decoupling are valid, we would have all benefited from a response from him regarding which of those arguments he believes are and are not valid and why.
I am very uncomfortable writing this, but this is the second time the President of the ATA has publicly stated that the concerns of members who disagree with him regarding decoupling are “something one would expect from a protectionist-based medieval guild.” The first time was in ATATalk, and I witnessed this name-calling immediately shut down the discussion. For what it is worth, I don’t identify with this label. Ted, I would have hoped that after a year of hearing points like mine and others that you would have provided a more considerate response to those of us who answered ATA’s request in the Chronicle to provide member feedback. You may look at your words differently, but as a regular member, I want to point out that it is difficult to speak up, and it is damaging to the association when people perceive the ideas of those who do to be dismissed by leaders elected to represent them.
I hope that for the next month, while people are deciding what and who to vote for, as well as after when some people will be disappointed by the results, that we can all engage in respectful conversations and work together for the benefit of ATA.
Update: I did get a little clarification about the guild analogy from someone who agreed with it, and in my opinion, the analogy does not hold up. Suffice it to say that neither my experience working as a translator before joining the ATA nor my experience in the ATA has resembled the description made regarding guilds. The ATA does not strictly enforce prices or prohibit competition “within the guild or externally.” We all know ATA is not price-fixing, nor is it preventing anyone from making a living in translation.
The ATA providing one path to career growth does not constitute controlling this path for all. There are over 600,000 translators worldwide proving they can work without ATA-Certification (or membership) so I don’t see the ATA as “controlling the pathway and standards” for anything other than ATA-Certification, which is one of several voluntary credentials within our industry. Within the ATA, nobody is indentured, and nobody’s career path is limited by others. I am not sure how getting a grade of PASS on a 3-hour exam (without even any specific feedback) could be compared to years of being controlled as an apprentice. Especially when for me that pass came after I was already supporting myself professionally as a translator. The only thing certified members can do in terms of certification that nonmembers can’t is claim ATA certification as a marketing tool. Others use ATA membership alone as their marketing tool. We have the credibility that goes along with certification thanks to those tirelessly working to support the Certification Program—thank you!! Graders, while considered experts, are volunteers and not “masters” benefiting from the work of any indentured servant test taker. So really, I don’t see how any of the description of a medieval guild applies to the ATA.
I am appalled that The Chronicle allowed to publish a statement with such non-substantiated and derogatory adjectives toward members in disagreement with the author, Mr. Wozniak. A ‘protectionist-based medieval guild’, where he had no problem in sitting comfortably at the top as a President, though!
I know of no professional association which certifies people out of the blue – this is something that proz.com does… just saying!
The ATA certification was created to recognize the excellence among its members, not to ‘legitimize’ random people. It will be interesting to see how the ATA will try to highlight the benefit of being an ATA member instead of “just” ATA-certified, since membership dues will bring a steady cash flow every year, as opposed to a one-off exam fee. Personally, I don’t think my clients see any difference between being ATA certified vs. ATA member – as long as I associate my name with the ATA it is enough for them. I think Mrs. Hartstein’s question is pivotal: “Are we fundamentally a credentialing entity or a membership association?”
In these months of discussion on the issue of decoupling I have never read any factual statement on why decoupling is a good thing, just references to the Hamm report (which is 20 years old – per se, this should make us reflect if its suggestions are still actual) and the Knapp’s evaluation which was not-so-surprisingly in favor of decoupling.
A few reasons to vote AGAINST:
– Someone will have a cousin who got ATA certified despite not being a translator. How is this beneficial for me?
– Why would I pay a yearly membership when I could be simply certified and be done for life? Just to save $15 on ATA webinars?
– The ATA doesn’t provide any training to pass the ATA-certification exam, so it is not an educational institution and hence cannot issue educational credentials.
– The ATA doesn’t require any particular background to sit their Exam, hence what kind of ‘professionalism’ are they going to certify?
– Never in my professional experience I have seen the requirement to be ATA-certified to be able to submit translations to Courts, the USCIS, Consulates etc. I don’t feel the ATA-certification is something ATA owes to the world.
– Why experience and academic credentials are irrelevant to sit the ATA exam, if the ultimate goal of the ATA-certification it to helps recognize professionals?
– In the UK, academic credentials are enough to join their two translator’s associations (ITI and CIOL) and to use their logo/stamp to certify translations. In absence of academic credentials, the ITI let candidates sit their ITI Exam, which is considered proof of competency in lieu of academic credentials. However, the ITI-certified status is valid as long as the translator is a member of ITI. Thsi sounds so obvious, but not for the ATA.
– Those in favor of decoupling seems to be concerned of US antitrust laws and indicated that offering the ATA-exam only to ATA-members could be seen as trying to mingle with the certification market. Except there is no other translator’s certification in the US and there is no requirement to be certified to practice.
– In addition to the above, they have also mentioned that the price for non-members can’t be too much or it could be construed as indirectly trying to limit access to the certification – hence, what’s the economic benefit they have been talking about? I have never read any number to support their statement of this supposed financial benefit for the ATA.
– In addition to the above points, they don’t seem to be concerned that the ATA Exam is not accessible to all, since it is offered in bigger US cities, only but rarely abroad. People who need to pay for travel and accommodation expenses, are already limited and negatively affected by the current exam mode.
If we want to see the ATA revenues grow, the sensible thing is to keep the ATA Exam exclusive to members, allow to take the exam online so that it is available to more people in the US and worldwide, offer optional training to prepare for the ATA-Exam in all of the language combinations in which the exam is offered, implement requirements that will make the ATA-certified status stand out as a guarantee of professionalism (CPD), award the ATA-certified status by peer certification (so that a translator certified in Canada or Australia or the UK, is automatically recognized the ATA-certified status) or by academic credential (for those holding a higher level credential in Translation).
Just some concrete points from the middle-age!
Why should the ATA President be our moral compass? “The RIGHT thing to do”? Not for my business, it is not. Absolutely not.
Decoupling of certification is absolutely the WRONG thing to do. The opinions expressed previously in the Chronicle against the Board decoupling plan (Jan./Feb., July/Aug. 2020 issues) clearly show that.
In reply to “STATEMENT IN SUPPORT OF PROPOSED DECOUPLING BYLAWS AMENDMENT” that is signed by a bunch of past ATA Presidents.
Did you forgot to add the reason(s) why we should vote for decoupling or should be just take your word for it? It is rather odd that you support decoupling, urge us to vote for it, and not give a single reason why.
I am still on the fence and your “because I said so” does not sit well with me
– An ATA member sitting on a fence
I think it would be a good idea for me to weigh in on the bylaws amendment on nominations. At this point, though, I’m not sure which way to vote, so I invite you to accompany me as I think through this in writing. That way, you and I can both explore the considerations in this complex issue and see how my thinking turns out. I can’t wait to find out what I think!
The proposed bylaws amendment would require the Nominating and Leadership Development Committee (NLDC)’s nominations to include “at least two (2) candidates for the position of President-elect when that position is up for election”. Like many of you, I have been frustrated by the NLDC’s long-time practice of nominating two candidates for Board positions, but only one for officer positions. Last year, that issue was brought to a head when both Madalena and I were under consideration by the NLDC. The NLDC’s practice seemed to me to imply that the committee members thought that they were the ones to get to decide who gets to be an officer.
If that were the only consideration, I would be in favor of the amendment.
But.
In April 2019, following the NLDC’s single nominations for officers, the ATA Board changed the NLDC policy and charge to require multiple nominations for officers. The NLDC objected and in response, the Board reversed its decision at its October 2019 meeting, giving the NLDC the leeway to nominate “one or more” candidates but recommending multiple candidates where possible.
Let’s consider some aspects:
• The NLDC is charged not just with nominating, but with leadership development. This means that the NLDC keeps track of people as they rise in the ATA, and deliberates on recommending them for various positions, or inviting them to take leadership training.
• The NLDC has stated that it not only nominates people (particularly for the Board), but also supports them and encourages them, in order to have enough candidates.
• The NLDC states that the best practice for associations is for the Nominating Committee to only nominate one candidate for each position. In such a system, members who disagree with a nomination are invited to / free to nominate others by petition—an option that ATA Bylaws and policy also allow.
• When I ran for President-Elect by petition, the chair of the NLDC said to me that “the system worked”. However, my petition drive was not based on the idea that the NLDC had nominated the wrong person (Madalena was a great candidate and is a great President-Elect and I fully support her), but rather on the idea that the NLDC was not giving members a fair opportunity to choose its leaders.
• The NLDC has been in violation of this best practice for decades, pointing to the tradition of having multiple Board candidates as justification.
• The NLDC has also stated that a. it is difficult to find qualified candidates, b. that if someone loses, they may drop out of the Association, and c. if they are forced to nominate two candidates, sometimes one will clearly be a “straw candidate” just to satisfy the mandate of having two. In the last election, this was refuted by a. there were two qualified candidates, b. I lost and am still fiercely in love with ATA, and c. there are other strong leaders who could be President-Elect.
• Electing members to the Board is arguably more important than who the officers are, since officers are constrained by policies adopted by the Board.
• Robert’s Rules recommends that the Nominating Committee should be elected, not appointed by the Board.
Based on these ideas, here are some of my thoughts:
• I have to emphasize that the NLDC consists of past presidents and other significant volunteers who are working for the good of the Association.
• NLDC members work very hard to identify and recruit volunteers for various positions, most importantly for the Board.
• If best practice is for nominating committees to only nominate one candidate for each position, it may be that the NLDC has been working too hard getting candidates for the Board. It would be easier to follow best practices.
• The NLDC may have gone beyond its mandate and basically “planned futures” for various volunteers – including deciding when they would be nominated as Board members and officers. Not so good.
• The ongoing irritation with the NLDC stems from its practice of inconsistency, with multiple candidates for the more important Board positions and only one (usually) for the more visible officer positions.
• Since the NLDC is appointed, not elected, there is a possible perception of “insiders nominating insiders”.
And some conclusions:
• The Nominating Committee could be separated from the leadership development task – the two committees could coordinate.
• The current Bylaws Amendment is flawed in that it only mandates two candidates for President-Elect and ignores the other officer positions. Thus it is just as inconsistent as the NLDC’s past practice.
• Under current policy, the NLDC could announce that it will follow best practices in the future and only nominate one candidate for each position—that would justify the nomination-by-petition process and allow members to nominate when they perceive someone as a poor candidate—rather than having a petition drive to rectify perceived unfairness by the NLDC.
• The “straw man” argument doesn’t really hold water, not with an association as large as ours. (Expanding voting membership by changing the membership requirements would make the pool even larger.)
• The “disappointed candidate will quit” argument doesn’t hold water either, really; if someone is so little invested in the Association that they would quit the Association or resign from other volunteer activities if they lost an election, I’m not sure I’d want them leading us, either.
• If ATA were to change the Bylaws so that the Nominating Committee would be elected by the members, this could increase transparency and trust in the process.
Bottom line:
1. Inconsistency in nominating practice has been the real problem.
2. The current Bylaws amendment about nominations is flawed in that it perpetuates inconsistency. It might not be the best solution to the problem.
3. A better solution might be to have an elected Nominations Committee.
4. Another solution would be to mandate only ONE candidate from the NLDC for each office, and members could then exercise the petition option.
5. In the long run, it doesn’t matter. The Association will be in fine shape with only one candidate for each office, or with two candidates for each office. Whether or not this Bylaws amendment passes, candidates will still be nominated, there will still be elections, there will be winners and losers, and committed volunteers will still work for the good of the Association.
Thanks for listening.
Geoff
The Association has between 9,000 and 10,000 members, and, if memory serves, about 2,000 voting members. This platform (ATATalk) was set up a few years ago because a few members of the Business Practices list were frequently posting off-topic questions about ATA matters that really didn’t belong over there. This list is open to all ATA members (not just voting members) and has been announced in numerous venues, so any member who is interested can come here to talk about ATA issues. It is thus clear that many members do not choose to participate in this discussion.
That said, ATA leadership has never and will never try to prevent members from discussing ATA matters on any platform that they wish. You and any other member are free to post and discuss such matters in any venue and on any platform you may wish to do so. However, since it is impossible for any one person to be involved in every list everywhere, the advantage of ATAtalk to members is that the ATA Board reads it; some ideas from here have been implemented in policy (e.g., Helen Eby’s request for formalizing the resolutions procedure).
But, and in this I echo Jessica Hartstein (“Here’s to some healthier conversations”), we do need to maintain a respectful tone and stick to factual statements. The toxic tone of some posts in ATAtalk comes partly from baseless accusations, twisting people’s words, and assuming some kind of “deep state” conspiracy. For a pointed example, Ted Wozniak said, in part, that the purpose of the Election Policy “was to hinder or prevent the rise of a ‘good old boy network’ or culture in which a small clique perpetuates itself as the association’s leadership.” Taking the ‘good old boy network’ out of this context and making it into a pretext for attacking an (unproven, undocumented, and, in my opinion, unlikely) conspiracy among ATA leaders is unfair and unworthy of a profession where we pride ourselves on being very careful about meaning.
Now, some of you may perceive me as being an ATA insider, and I suppose I am, at this point. But as some of you know, I also challenged the status quo with my petitioned run for the presidency at the last election. So I can see both sides. Let me tell you how I became an ATA insider: I joined ATA in 1994 and attended the Austin conference. For several years, I attended ATA as a representative of Kent State University, working in the Exhibit Hall. In the early 2000s, I grew interested in ATA grading and tried to volunteer, but it was not until 2006 that there was an opening; this was my first volunteer position in the Association. In 2008, I volunteered to be Secretary of the Certification Committee (2008-2010) and then was appointed Chair (2010-2014). During those years, I was busy trying to improve the Certification Program and was almost entirely unaware of other ATA politics. Thus it came as a complete surprise to me when the Nominating Committee asked me to run for the Board in 2013–and I turned them down, because we were in the middle of a project on the Certification Committee. I did run the next year and have served six years on the Board. During this time, various Board members have been seated and rotated off, representing a wide variety of interests and points of view, and most of them also continuing to work on or chair various committees. So — I think I became an insider like most other people: by volunteering in an area of interest, working hard, and contributing to the association. I would say that virtually all volunteers in the Association, at all levels, do the same; they contribute what they can, in an area they like, for the good of all. And sometimes, people step up and take jobs that aren’t very popular or that nobody really wants to do. I’m thinking of the hard work that Division leaders do, for instance.
FACTS ABOUT THE DECOUPLING ISSUE: As I said above, factual statements are the standard we should use to form opinions. We have three sets of factual statements upon which to base our decision about opening the exam to non-members (commonly referred to as decoupling): the ATA Bylaws, the Hamm Report of 2000, and the Knapp Report of 2020. The relevant facts are:
* ATA Bylaws: Article II (Purposes), a. The Association shall be organized as a not-for-profit entity with the following objectives:
1) to promote the recognition of the translation and interpreting professions;
2) to promote the communication and dissemination of knowledge for the benefit of translators and interpreters;
3) to formulate and maintain standards of professional ethics, practices, and competence;
(etc.)
* The Hamm Report of 2000 indicated that at that time, the trend was toward making certification available to any qualified applicant, and that paying dues to an association has no relationship to an individual’s competence in a profession or discipline. Very few national certification bodies have association membership eligibility requirements.
* The Knapp Report of 2020 was commissioned to “verify whether the organization should continue to work on implementing the recommendations (i.e., are the recommendations still pertinent); and identify additional areas for improvement, as appropriate, including those which may relate to changes in certification standards and best practices which have taken place since 2000.” The Knapp organization reviewed the original Hamm recommendations and provided “commentary regarding the current relevance and importance of each recommendation; and a conclusion as to whether each recommendation has been implemented, along with suggestions for additional improvements or changes, when appropriate.” In the section on Eligibility, for the item “Remove membership as a criteria”, the report states that “This is required by standards and advisable for a variety of reasons as outlined in the separate statement provided by Knapp on this topic.”
MY ANALYSIS: The Hamm Report and the up-do-date Knapp Report concur that certification should not be linked to membership. Given that the first three points of ATA’s Purpose as set forth in the Bylaws focus on “the translation and interpreting professions”, “for the benefit of translators and interpreters”, and the objective “to formulate and maintain standards of professional ethics, practices, and competence”, but do not say *one* *single* *word* about membership, I conclude that ATA’s purpose is to serve the entire profession, and therefore that certification should be available to the entire profession without the requirement of paying for membership. Indeed, ATA Certification is an important signal to the profession, to translators, interpreters, agencies, and the general public of a practitioner who meets “standards of professional ethics, practices, and competence”. And yet, any certified member, who is presumed to meet those “standards of professional ethics, practices, and competence”, currently somehow loses that imprimatur of quality if the individual decides to no longer be a member of the Association. That’s not fair, and neither is it right to leave certification coupled to membership. I will be voting FOR decoupling because it is the industry best practice, enhances the profession, and increases fairness for individuals and prestige for ATA.
Sincerely,
Geoff
When presented with the idea of presenting a referendum to the membership, in response to a petition submitted to the Board, one ATA Director stated, “Why should we change our course now? We have no obligation to poll the membership. We have no idea how many people [oppose decoupling]. This issue likely will go nowhere”.
It’s ironic that that same director now is quoting the Bylaws to us and trying to twist arms to get us to relinquish our rights.
That same director also once said on ATAtalk that if decoupling were to be implemented, “we would have to ‘clean up’ the Bylaws afterwards” to reflect that change.
I’ve never heard of a “Bylaws cleanup”, so it seems he was acknowledging that there is a requirement in the Bylaws that would need to be changed in order to actually take away our right to certification.