Activities & Products / 2007 / National IEP AA Directors' Summit

Due to the success of the BA Directors meeting in San Diego, the AA-BA Partnership work team embarked on creating and hosting of a similar meeting of AA Interpreter Education Directors. Planning began in January 2007 for a three-day, invitation–only summit designed to address:

“…transition, transfer and articulation issues between 2-year and 4-year interpreter education programs. The main goal of the Summit is to begin a dialogue among associate level/two year program directors regarding their response to the 2012 RID certification requirement.  Over the three days, [participants] will identify and explore current and creative models for successful AA to BA partnership, have the opportunity to network with colleagues from programs exploring similar partnership models, and hear from higher education leaders in the field of two-year to four-year transition and articulation, as well as from a panel of professionals from other fields who have experienced issues similar to ours regarding increased educational requirements” (Summit Welcome Letter, May 18, 2007).

In May 2007, fifty percent of directors or their representatives from the 125 then-identified programs attended this historic Summit. This level of participation was considered successful given the short six-week turnaround from invitation to arrival, differing institutional timelines for requesting travel funds, and the fact that some programs were involved in final exams or graduation that weekend.

The primary goal of the Summit was to obtain a better understanding of the current state-of-interpreter- education as it relates to AA-BA partnerships and the 2012 RID certification mandate. Through formalized presentations and anecdotal participant sharing, the Summit provided a “snapshot” of our field, shedding light on A.A. IEP program directors’ knowledge, attitudes, beliefs and anticipated actions around this topic. This endeavor was an important initial step to determining evidence-based practices in AA-BA partnerships.

The AA-BA Partnership work team provided participants with a variety of resources including Improving Access to the Baccalaureate (2004), a report prepared by the American Association of Community Colleges and American Association of State Colleges and Universities.

The program opened with a keynote presentation by David Longanecker, Executive Director of the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education, who provided a national perspective on articulation. He addressed two-year to four-year transition including challenges faced by higher education today such as changing demographics and resource constraints. A panel of representatives from the professions of Early Childhood Education, Respiratory Therapy and Vocational Rehabilitation discussed the impact of rising educational requirements within their professions. Over the next two days, participants worked in large and small groups to identify and define innovative partnership models for interpreter education programs.

At the Summit’s end, the AA-BA Partnership work team had gathered information from the participants regarding current partnership practices, explored current and creative models for successful A.A. to B.A. partnerships, identified barriers to success and resources needed for success, and began a system-wide conversation of colleagues seeking partnership. These findings are published in a monograph entitled Toward Effective Practices: A National Dialogue on AA-BA Partnerships.