'Capturing' and 'Prescribing' desirable attributes of community interpreting: design and implementation of testing systems in four anglophone countries

This paper examines six tests used as diagnostic measures of skill level for the purposes of formal certification of community interpreters in the following, mostly Anglophone countries: Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States. The psychometric measures of ‘content validity’ and ‘utility’ are applied to components of the six tests. Tests generally attract high ratings for content validity in relation to inter-lingual transfer and ethics, and medium-level ratings for overall linguistic proficiency (where tested) and cross-cultural competency. However, other areas of community interpreting performance: technical, research and interpersonal skills attract lower ratings or it is not possible to ascertain that these skills are elicited from test-takers. For the psychometric measure of utility, the six tests record better ratings due to the general amenability and affordability of the tests as entry-level requirements to the profession. Other recent initiatives, such as the ISO Draft Guidelines, are discussed in the context of desirable attributes of community interpreters which include not only ‘one-off’ testing but attendant training and study as a pre- or co-requisite to testing.