News

SCIT participates in MIIS Jubilee Conference

On 4 and 5 May 2019 Middleberry Institute of International Studies at Monterey hosted the conference to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the T&I and Localization program in Monterey. SCIT representatives – Director Irina Alexeeva and Deputy Director Angelique Antonova took part in the festive events as well as in the conference program. SCIT and Televic Education presented their joint project for teaching/assessing interpreter students in a professional setting. SCIT-Televic Education cooperation was used as a shoswcase to demonstrate how important it is to provide customized software and machinery for quality trainig of future language specialists.

Upon the completion of the forum Irina Alexeeva and Angelique Antonova were invited by Rosa Kavenoki, Director of the Russian T&I Program at Monterey, to hold a series of meetings and master-classes for the MIIS students.

Meeting at UN

On 29 May the UN Department for General Assembly and Conference Management hosted the Herzen University delegation.  Catherine Pollard, Under-Secretary-General for General Assembly and Conference Management, and Movses Abelian, Assistant to Under-Secretary General, were happy to welcome in the UN Headquarters Yulia Komarova, Vice-Rector for International Cooperation, Irina Alexeeva, SCIT Director, and Angelique Antonova, SCIT Deputy Director. The participants of the meeting discussed the cooperation under the Memorandum of Understanding between our institutions, stressing the imporatnce of virtual classes, master-classes of practicing interpreters and internships. The Herzen University and SCIT leaders thanked the UN DGACM for their efforts to promote cooperation, and Ms. Pollard and Mr. Abelian congratulated SCIT on the new achievements of SCIt graduates in the UN Language Competitive Examinations.

22-26 April 2019: Master-classes of Ian Newton

On 22-26 April SCIT hosted Ian Newton, former ILO Chief-Interpreter and trainer from FTI, Geneva University. With the Dual Degree Agreement still in operation between our schools, Mr. Newton was invited to give a series of master-classes in retour for the SCIT students. The guest lecturer was able to give the students necessary guidance and shared professional tips in interpreting into English, which are invaluable in the final lap of the academic year. The students appreciated the expertise, but also the engaging personality of Mr. Newton. Looking forward to new meetings with Ian!

DG SCIC Conference in Brussels

On 4 and 5 of April 2019 the traditional conference on the recent trends in interpreting and interpreter training was organized by the Directorate General for Interpreting, European Commission, in Brussels. Among the speakers were Florika Fink-Hoojer, Director General DG Interpretation, Javier Hernándes Saseta, Head of Multilingualism and Knowledge Development Unit, Filip Majcen, Director of Interpretation Services Management and Professional Support, and others. DG SCIC’s team also presented its Knowledge Centre on Interpretation, 2.0 and attracted a lot of attention. Universities’ representatives spoke about the issues of Artificial Intelligence, machine translation and technologies, and how they transform the learning and working environment for interpreters. SCIT was represented by Deputy Director Angelique Antonova.

SCIT takes part in EMCI General Assembly Meeting in Brussels

On 4 April the EMCI General Assembly meeting took place in Brussels. SCIT was represented by Deputy Director Angelique Antonova. The participants discussed the preparations for the student meeting in Prague which is to take place on 24-28 April. The meeting will be attended by four SCIT students.   Also much attention was given to the implementation of the European Commission grant projects in quality assurance control and developing resources and speech repositories for graduates about to take language examinations for IOs. SCIT is an active participant of these projects.