Reducing the shortage of BSL interpreters
For followers of linguistic news snippets, hardly a week goes by without some comment on the shortage of BSL (British Sign Language) interpreters; indeed, sign language interpreters generally are in short supply worldwide with some countries so chronically short that medical care and legal proceedings are often seriously effected.
Now a college in Carmarthen, Wales; the Coleg Sir Gâr, is hoping to reduce the shortfall in British Sign Language interpreters by offering a new modular course in BSL and so far 70 students have taken the new course.
The course’s modules are taken over the course of three years and results so far have been impressive; in the current academic year, over 30 students took the first year modules and all of them achieved a 100% pass rate. This success seems to have carried through into subsequent years with average pass marks of 100% and 80% respectively being achieved in years two and three.
Commenting on the success of the course, Keith Hughes who is one of the course teachers at Coleg Sir Gâr said that he was naturally delighted with the success of the course and sincerely hoped that some of his students would go o to become fully qualified sign language interpreters in future years.
We all wish the students the best of luck as there is a shortage of such interpreters in Wales where over 3,000 people use BSL as their preferred language.