While Dagy was getting
her master’s degree in conference interpreting at the University of Vienna, the
EU’s recruiting efforts for freelance interpreters kicked into full gear. A lot
of freelancers will be retiring soon, which means that especially the German
and the English booths desperately need new talent. That is why the EU started
a serious campaign to get young conference interpreters to apply for what they
call an inter-institutional accreditation test. We don't know how many people actually get invited to the test, but we do know that the application process is highly competitive. The EU reimburses candidates for their travel expenses (certain restrictions apply). The lucky 20% who pass this notoriously difficult test are then
qualified to work as accredited conference interpreters (ACI in EU jargon) for
the European institutions: Commission, Council, Court of Justice and Parliament.
The EU advertising efforts struck a chord with Dagy. She applied right after
she got her diploma and was invited to take the test shortly after that, which
she passed. In this blog post, we will focus on some basic information and
Dagy’s personal impressions of her freelance test and hints on how one might
want to prepare for it.
General info:
- The EU has made available a cornucopia of information regarding accreditation tests. Among others, you might find these videos interesting: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hKufxTAvrQ (German) and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MA2fWvtMPDU (English)
- Here’s a video of what a test might look like for the English booth: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=InpIBvAVRXE
- More basic information is available here: http://europa.eu/interpretation/accreditation_en.htm
- And don’t forget to check out this Facebook site: https://www.facebook.com/interpretingforeurope
- You do not have to be an EU citizen to interpret for the EU as a freelance interpreter. However, EU citizenship is required for staff interpreters.
Please note that a
master’s degree in conference in interpreting is required to apply
(exceptions may be made for languages of lesser diffusion, such as Slovak) or significant experience as a conference interpreter (we are talking 300+ full days of conference interpreting). The minimum
number of languages for the German booth is your native language plus three
(again, fewer languages may be acceptable for languages of lesser diffusion).
Here are Dagy’s
impressions of the test, which took place in Brussels on November 16:
- Contrary to popular belief, the jury DOES want you to pass. They
need you and I could tell. They took really good care of us during the
6-hour process, which involved a lot of waiting (actual test time was
about one hour). More about the
“Bogeymen myth”: http://theinterpreterdiaries.com/2012/10/31/bogeymen-in-brussels/
- Long consecutive is six minutes, simultaneous is 10 (you can use your own
headset). Note: on the consecutive, the entire segment is one segment that lasts 6 minutes, which means you will be listening for six minutes, taking notes, and then interpreting the whole thing, which is a huge challenge. Many American court interpreting exams also have six-minute consecutive portions, but during those, the individual segments are only 20-75 words long, so we wanted to clarify that this is not the case here. One of the speeches has EU-specific terminology, the others
are fairly general. The speed was
not a problem. There were no crazy long sentences, no tricky idioms or
jokes, no unfinished sentences, very few numbers. The structure of all
speeches was logical and easy to follow.
- The recently introduced new system provides that two people listen
to their consecutive speeches (read by a real person, no recordings) together. Then, one of them leaves the room
(taking her notes with her) while the other does the interpretation right away.
For the second language, it’s the other way around. Obviously, none of the
candidates gets to listen to the other’s performance.
- You may ask a question right after the speaker finishes her or his
speech in the language of the speaker. It might be wise to limit your
question to essentials, such as a number you would like to double-check.
- After a short deliberation at the end of the day, they jury will tell you if you have passed the examination There is no official score nor a precise breakdown of your performance in terms of percentages or anything else. It's pass/fail, and yes, we agree that there is some room for improvement on that front, as it does not seem very transparent and test-takers don't know what the metrics are. For instance, do you need an 80 to pass? Or a 95? We don't know, but we do know that you have to be excellent.
- According to the new system, only two languages are tested (which
you cannot choose yourself). After I passed Spanish and English into
German, I will be tested for my third and last language, French, on
December 19.
While the jury is
friendly (but very down to business) and they certainly need you, they will not
lower their quality standards. An excellent performance in consecutive
interpretation is essential, including a logical structure, good delivery, eye
contact with the jury and lots of self-confidence. And of course they expect excellent
command of your native language, which might sound like a no-brainer, but often
turns out to be a problem. In simultaneous, they expect top-notch technique,
which includes not sticking too close to the source text. Which brings us to
test preparations:
- What you learn at the university is not enough. You need to practice
on your own, preferable every day (I did for about a year and a half; no excuses).
Record your interpretation and listen to it. Be self-critical. Candidates
will get access to the EU’s excellent “multilingual speeches” database (also
used by students enrolled in interpreting programs). The ones labeled as
“test-type” are similar to what you will get at the test. After I
exhausted that database, I started using www.ted.com
and www.tedx.com. Most speeches are in
English, but quite a few are available in other languages as well.
- You need to have an excellent command of your native language. Read
good newspapers and magazines on an everyday basis and don’t forget
literature, both fiction and non-fiction.
- You need to know what’s going on in the EU and in the countries
where “your” languages are spoken. www.europa.eu
offers a wealth of information, and I also recommend subscribing to the “Eurotopics”
(www.eurotopics.net) service,
which will give you a digest of EU-related newspaper articles once a day
(available in German, English and French). If you work with French, you
might find this behind-the-scenes blog interesting: http://bruxelles.blogs.liberation.fr/
- Try to control your nerves (pop an herbal pill if you need to). The
setting can be intimidating – after all, you will be taking your test
either at the European Commission or the Parliament in an impressive room
with quite a large jury. If you’re nervous, try not to show it. Try
imagining the situation ahead of time and prepare for it mentally. And
don’t forget that these tests cost a lot of time and money and that it’s a
privilege to be there in the first place, even if you don’t pass on your
first try. Not many do.
- I believe that listening to international radio stations in all my
languages (Radio France Internationale, BBC, NPR, Radio Exterior de España,
etc.) really helped.
- On the day of your exam, warm up first. I had two short speeches on
my iPhone (don’t exhaust yourself) and did those before I headed to my test.
Good luck to anybody
planning on taking the accreditation test soon! If you like a challenge, this
is for you!
Don’t hesitate to post
any questions you might have.
23 comments:
Nice post! Lots of useful information in there.
I just thought I'd share with your readers some figures that one of my readers shared on my blog post about pass rates for the EU accreditation tests. They're quite eye-opening:
During 2011 the inter-institutional Selection Office managed 42 ACI accreditation tests. Following the screening of 1.616 candidate files, 520 candidates were invited to take pa
rt in tests, 428 candidates were tested and 101 candidates finally passed. The success rate of 24% is slightly lower than in 2010 (28%). During the course of 2011 the Selection Office also organised 130 SCIC language adding tests (136 in 2010) with a success rate of
48%.
These figures were taken directly from the Annual activity report of DG SCIC for 2011 (http://ec.europa.eu/atwork/synthesis/aar/doc/scic_aar_2011.pdf)
So yes, Dagmar, you are one of the lucky few :). Congratulations!
The only purpose of this comment is to say CONGRATULATIONS Dagy on passing the test! WOW! That is incredible; wonder twin power...activate!
Congratulations! What an amazing achievement.
@InterpreterDiaries: Thank you so much for sharing this highly interesting data with us and our readers. Great stuff! And yes, Dagy is pretty over the moon -- we both are.
@Corinne: Thanks so much, girl! It's all been a very amazing blur!
Firstly, congratulations!!!
Thank you for this post! I'm in the EMCI course now and I am as excited as I am overwhelmed by the amount of information I must digest.
Your article is a little kick in the butt - I hear what you're telling us from my trainers constantly but it seems one can't hear it enough times!
I've been very pleasantly surprised at how supportive interpreters at institutions have been. It's very reassuring :)
Great account - and congratulations to Dagy!! Well done!!!
Allow me also to draw attention our very substantial pages on how to become an interpreter, including for the EU, currently available in EN, FR and DE. See: http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/scic/become-an-interpreter/index_en.htm
Congratulations and having sat an accreditation/language-adding test...let me count...3 times (ES, then EN, then EN retour) I can confirm that all of the above is accurate and very useful!
@Céline: Thank you very much for your sweet comment! The Jenner family is quite proud. :)
@Anonymous: Glad to hear you find the post useful (+ a kick in the butt). And yes, you are right: fellow interpreters at the EU institutions are wonderful and supportive, aren't they?
@Ian: Thanks a lot. And we really appreciate you sharing the link with us and with our readers -- you are right, there is a lot of great information there!
@Katka: Thank you very much! How did you do on the tests? Surely you passed. Awesome that you think the info is useful -- that was the idea! There are so many myths circulating about the exam that we figured it was time to give a true account of how it all happens.
Hi and thank you so much for posting this, it's an eye opener for me since I didn't know anything about this test. I have a question, in order to be an applicant you have to know at least three languages right? including your mother tongue or an additional 3, which means 4 in total?
@Anonymous: Thanks for the post. Yes, the EU institutions usually require a total of 4 languages (native language plus three) for the most "common" languages, but they will make exceptions for languages of lesser diffusion, such as Latvian, Estonian, Slovak, etc. We do think this is evaluated on a case-by-case basis. What's your native language?
Congratulations! Not only for having passed the examination! But also for your amazing book on entrepreneurial linguists :D (I can't hide I dream of setting up a business with my sister and you two inspire me!!)
I want to thank you as well fro the encouragement and have a question (as I'm attending a Conference Interpreting course): how much time did you practice every day?
Thank you, Dagmar, and wait to read more about you, twins :D
@Claudia: Thanks so much for your very kind comment, Claudia! We are so delighted to hear that you like our book. You should definitely set up a business with your sister, you can do it! :)
In terms of practicing, it varied, but we'd say at least 30 minutes a day. Sometimes less, sometimes more, but that's about average. Sometimes up to an hour.
Congratulation Dagmar for the French test of this morning! Seems like someone passed with flying colors! Pity I did not stay to make the photo like last time. Michel
@Michel: Thank you so much! It was so great to see you again. :) It's great to see friendly and familiar faces at the EU.
What a great post, and a challenge I might want to take up!
What a great post, and a challenge I might want to take up!
Seems the requirements are even more strict than the UN exam as far as number of languages required goes.
Congrats Dagy!!! You are both Super Woman! You really deserve this new accomplishment! Keep on dreaming!
What an amazing achievement!
I guess you should write a book for interpreters.
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