A Virtual Class with Experts of the European Commission and the United Nations
The 2018/2019 academic year at the Caspian Higher School of Interpreting and Translation ended with a virtual class with our foreign partners – the Directorate-General for Interpretation of the European Commission and the United Nations Office at Geneva – which took place on May 27, 2019 at the Conference Interpretation Centre of our School. This time, our students were to deal with speeches in English, German and Russian, delivered by the DG SCIC experts and trainers of the Caspian Higher School of Interpreting and Translation: Alexander Drechsel, a DG SCIC interpreter, gave a speech in German about current political situation in the European Union in the context of the European Parliament elections, his colleague Michael Somers delivered an English speech about green energy and the experience of China and Iceland in using renewable energy sources, while Ekaterina Shamova, a trainer at the Caspian Higher School of Interpreting and Translation, touched upon an unusual but nonetheless very interesting topic of relevance and popularity of comic books nowadays.The consecutive interpretation was performed by our 2nd-year MA students – this virtual class was a good opportunity for them to get a final feedback from the DG SCIC and UNOG experts before their upcoming final exam in interpretation, where they are expected to demonstrate everything they have learnt over two years of studies at our School. The first-year students also did not sit on their hands but worked actively in the interpretation booths and honed their CI skills, since the VC was attended by a real “pure customer” – Prof. Bruce Leimsidor from Ca’Foscari University of Venice, who was very satisfied with the format of the meeting and with the quality of our students’ interpretation, and at the end of the VC he also commented on their interpretation into English as a native speaker.
The virtual class gave the students another opportunity to get valuable recommendations from the DG SCIC interpreters and a detailed feedback from the UNOG experts. The students themselves also exchanged their views concerning the interpretation and are looking forward to next virtual classes with our foreign partners.