Translation Competence

Because of accreditation, budget, and accountability pressures at the institutional and program levels, technical and professional communication faculty are more than ever involved in assessment-based activities. Using assessment to identify a program's strengths and weaknesses allows faculty to work toward continuous improvement based on their articulation of learning and behavioral goals and outcomes for their graduates. This article describes the processes of program assessment based on pedagogical goals, pointing out options and opportunities that will lead to a meaningful and manageable experience for technical communication faculty, and concludes with a view of how the larger academic body of technical communication programs can benefit from such work. As ATTW members take a careful look at the state of the profession from the academic perspective, we can use assessment to further direct our programs to meet professional expectations and, far more importantly, to help us meet the needs of the well-educated technical communicator.

Programs in technical and professional communication are continually challenged by issues of location and dislocation. Historic changes and interdisciplinary initiatives are in progress at colleges and universities worldwide. The five articles of this special issue will offer a portrait of the multiple ways that technical communication programs are positioning themselves to do innovative teaching and research.

This study examines the skills that recent technical communication graduates and managers believe technical communication students need before entering business and industry as new technical communicators. Through questionnaires and interviews with recent graduates and managers of technical communication departments as well as an analysis of the participating schools' curricula, this study suggests areas where technical communication may need more preparation, including business operations, project management, problem-solving skills, and scientific and technical knowledge. Further research is needed at local, state, and national levels to analyze technical communication undergraduate curricula along with responses from recent graduates of technical communication programs and managers of technical communication programs. Only through continued research can we ensure that future technical communicators receive an education that eases their transition into the world of business and industry.

Assessment continues to be an important issue for technical communicators in both practitioner and academic contexts. In this article, we investigate methods of program assessment used by corporate learning sites and we profile value add methods as a new way to both construct and evaluate academic programs in technical communication. Our goal is to introduce value added assessment methods as one way to supplement and expand current methods of program assessment. The article initially reviews Return on Investment (ROI) indicators as a widely used model for assessing programs. However, we are critical of these indicators, suggesting that they are biased against technical communication in both practitioner and academic contexts. The article then examines and critiques assessment methods from corporate training environments. These include methods employed by corporate universities and value added process-based assessment methods. The second half of the article profiles value added methods by applying them in a brief assessment of a technical communications certificate program. We conclude that while the program uses ROI indicators as a marketing device, the value the program brings and adds to its university is the “portal” it creates for university and business community collaboration. This value cannot be fully demonstrated solely through the use of ROI indicators. The article then discusses the kinds of programmatic negotiations value added processes require within university contexts that may impose non-value added activities on departments and programs. The article concludes by critically examining the appropriateness of corporate assessment methods for academic contexts.

Translation starts with a document in one language and ends with a document with the same meaning in another language. Technical communication entails designing and writing a document from scratch in one language. The answer to the question of “Which, of translation or writing, comes first?” seems relatively obvious – the document needs to be written before it can be translated. However, when looking at translation and technical communication as professions and examining how the professionals are trained, the answer is not quite as clear-cut. In the United States, translators and technical communicators have different qualifications, different skills – in particular different language skills – and have degrees in different fields. Only recently has there appeared a certain convergence between the professions. In Europe, and more specifically in France, the profession of technical communicator is quite recent, as are the corresponding academic programs. Many technical communicators came to the profession from translation. The convergence therefore is perceived as being far greater. The purpose of this paper is to launch a comparative study of the competences or skills of translators and technical communicators, based on the existing European Master’s in Translation (EMT) list of competences for translators. The goal of this study would be to define the core skills for technical communicators, to examine to what extent they overlap with the competences of translators and ultimately, to establish a referential for training programs in technical communication.

The Relevance of the Research topic lies in the current stage of development of physical education in schools, characterized by the need to update content, constant search for effective methods to develop physical qualities, and the integration of innovations into physical education classes and extracurricular activities. One such innovation is aerial acrobatics and pole sports, which have gained popularity as forms of motor activity influencing students' interest in physical exercise and the development of physical qualities. The Purpose and Methods of the Research were to experimentally assess the impact of a comprehensive physical and technical training program in aerial acrobatics and pole sports on flexibility and power endurance development. The study employed analysis and synthesis of literature, pedagogical experimentation, and methods of mathematical statistics. The Results revealed improvements in flexibility indicators during «Bridge» exercises, changing from 45,07±5,42 cm to 37,13±3,79 cm; «Longitudinal split on the right» from -2,53±2,31 cm to 4,33±1,03 cm; «Left longitudinal split» from -4,7±1,47 cm to 4,47±1,17 cm; and «Lumbar split» from -5,6±1,83 cm to -2,73±1,39 cm. A statistically significant difference was observed at p<0.05. Similar improvements were found in power endurance development, with statistically significant differences between experimental group (EG) and control group (CG) indicators. For instance, during the «Bending and extending the arms in a supine position» exercise, EG indicators improved from 21,93±1,2 times to 33,13±1,14 times, and the time of maintaining body position in the supine position changed from 125,33±11,66 s to 288,0±18,18 s (p<0,05). In Conclusion, it has been established that a comprehensive program of physical and technical training incorporating aerial acrobatics and pole sports, which includes general and specialized exercises along with technical training, is more effective and positively impacts the development of flexibility and strength endurance. This is evidenced by the statistically significant improvement in these physical qualities among the experimental group (EG) girls compared to the control group (CG) across all parameters studied.

Completion rate of military training programs is a commonly observed metric across the U.S. Air Force (USAF). Although Basic Military Training aims to identify recruits who possess the foundational elements for all Airmen, USAF technical school training programs aim to produce specialized and operations-ready Airmen. These training programs vary in duration and intensity to best simulate an operational environment and for Airmen to demonstrate the minimum competencies necessary for career progression within the respective USAF specialty. This study explored how intellectual aptitudes and personality tendencies differentiate between Airmen who are successful versus Airmen who are unsuccessful in completion of the weather specialist (1W0X1) technical training course. Results suggest that intellectual aptitudes and the addition of a narrow operationalization of personality traits were associated with higher performance. The challenge lies in making the analysis as precise as possible to gain a deeper understanding of the specific factors associated with optimal training results.

Typical model curricula in engineering disciplines assume that training in communication will occur early in the student's academic career in the course taken to meet the general liberal arts requirements of the university. This paper argues that this assumption defines communication as a preliminary skill to be learned as a prelude to technical study. An alternative view perceives increasing sophistication in the technical disciplines as requiring a simultaneous increase in sophistication in communication. The Program in Scientific and Technical Communication at the University of Washington is designed according to the latter view. The courses address the needs of engineers as these needs emerge and change across the academic and professional life of the engineer.

Problem: Perhaps it is presumptuous of technical communicators to assume that, because some of their skills that might be employed in developing and delivering training materials, that those skills alone are qualifications to work in training, much less the source by which the processes of Training might be examined. Using data from one survey and one interview-based study of the work of Technical communication and Training groups, as well as participation on committees responsible for certification examinations for technical communicators and trainers, this tutorial analyzes differences in the occupational cultures of the two fields. Key concepts: The work differs: technical communicators produce content that explains how to perform tasks; trainers produce programs that develop skills that a third party can verify. To do so, technical communicators follow a process that emphasizes writing and production; trainers follow a process that emphasizes the analysis of intended goals and evaluation of whether those goals have been achieved. The guiding philosophy of Technical communication is usability; the guiding philosophy of Training is performance. Although both disciplines are rooted in cognitive psychology, the primary intellectual roots of Technical communication are in rhetoric and composition, while the primary intellectual roots are in education. The preferred research methods of Technical communication are critical; the preferred research methods of trainers are empirical qualitative and quantitative methods. Key lessons: As a result, Technical communication professionals and researchers who want to work in training should approach the field in a culturally appropriate way by (1) recognizing distinctions between a communication product and a training program, (2) recognizing distinctions in work processes, (3) recognizing distinctions in language, (4) recognizing differences in values, and (5) acknowledging that an academic discipline of training exists.

The study determined the challenges of technical vocational education and training programmes in polytechnics in Nigeria. The study which adopted descriptive survey design used purposive sampling technique to obtain a sample of 518 subjects (consisting of 98 electrical/electronic engineering lecturers and 420 final year students. One research question and one hypothesis guided the study. A 10-item questionnaire titled “Constraints to Effective TVET Programmes in Polytechnics Questionnaire (CETPPQ)”, was used for the study. Mean and standard deviation were descriptive statistical tools adopted to analyze the research questions while t-test was the inferential statistics used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The findings revealed among others that lack of teaching staff, inadequate funding, inadequate training facilities among others modern equipment and tools, defective curricula, poor professional development of staff, poor institution-industry synergy, among others constitute constraints to quality polytechnic education in Nigeria. Consequently, it was recommended among others that government should provide requisite human and material resources needed for quality TVET programmes in Nigerian polytechnics for skill training of technology students.

Unemployment has been a long-standing problem in many countries, including the Philippines, and the recent pandemic even worsened the economic conditions of Filipinos with a large part of the population losing their jobs. One way to create more platforms that will enable the employability of the population is through the technical and vocational education and training (TVET) program, whose goal is to produce middle- and high-skilled graduates ready to take on the demands of the rapidly changing economy. With the current gender gap in terms of employment, this study focuses on the employment status of female graduates of TVET and the possible factors that influence the employment of Filipino female TVET graduates were determined. The survey data collected by the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) in 2018 for their employability study of 2017 women TVET graduates was utilized in this study. Binary Firth logistic regression models were fitted on subpopulations of TVET female graduates who were employed before and after training. Results have shown a significant increase in the proportion of employed women after graduation, which was indicated in the estimates before and after the training. Among the unemployed Filipino female before the training, more than half of them (52%) were employed after the training. Age, education, region, and reasons for taking up a program showed to be determinants of the employability of female TVET graduates. The factors that hinder women from entering employment despite their TVET training is the primacy of their household and family duties. Their choice or nature of programs shows that women take stereotypical roles associated with women, an issue that is still present today because of prevailing traditional gender norms. With the huge decline in economic activities brought by the pandemic, the results of this study will be particularly important in creating more and better employment opportunities for Filipino women.

Disadvantaged young people in Sub-Saharan Africa are the most stricken by unemployment because of their socio-economic background. Technical and vocational training programmes appear to be a remedy for their situation because the approaches of training delivery are practice-oriented. Using experiential learning theory, the article examines the enabling factors for the effectiveness of non-school-based technical and vocational training on skills acquisition. To get a full picture of the enabling factors for the effectiveness, the study used mixed methods research approach. Mixed methods research is an approach that involves a combination or association of both qualitative and quantitative approaches. The study used self-completion questionnaires, one-on-one semi-structured interviews and site observations to collect data from 512 young trainees, 24 training managers and 32 trainers. The findings reveal that the facilitation methods mostly used were the practical sessions in workshops, on-the-job training and workplace-based training. The author concludes that the practice-oriented methods were useful to empower the young trainees to acquire skills and abilities required for immediate employment. The article demonstrates how useful is the experiential learning theory in the delivery of the programmes for skills acquisition. The significant element of this article is the application of four stages of experiential learning theory to non-school-based technical and vocational training. The practical and social implications of the findings are that, while disadvantaged youths cannot access and afford higher education, public and private sectors can remedy their situation by providing non-school-based technical and vocational training to help them entre the labour market. The article is significant because youth growing up in poor households, and without access to opportunities to acquire skills, will have challenges to take care of their families in their adulthood.

This article, written by JPT Technology Editor Chris Carpenter, contains highlights of paper IPTC 16752, ’Technical Master Class: A New Approach to Knowledge Transfer,’ by Crystal Gully, ExxonMobil Upstream Research Company, prepared for the 2013 International Petroleum Technology Conference, Beijing, 26-28 March. The paper has not been peer reviewed. Technical master classes (TMCs) are a new training concept designed to accelerate building expertise among geoscience, engineering, and commercial professionals. The ExxonMobil TMC concept emphasizes transferring knowledge from experts to practitioners through a training process that blends mentoring and traditional technical training. Rather than teaching only the factual knowledge and technical concepts that dominate traditional classes, the master-class learning experience simulates real technical situations so that experts can coach practitioners through the complexities of an issue. Introduction In 2008, ExxonMobil’s executive leadership team challenged its upstream organization to address imminent knowledge and experience gaps in its technical workforce resulting from severe demographic shifts that threatened the entire petroleum industry. With the guidance of internal and external experts, a framework of solutions was proposed, aimed at accelerating the transfer of collective experience within the upstream organization. A project team was formed, and the concept of a TMC was piloted, revised, and implemented. The goal of the master-class project was to develop a training format that could effectively share experts’ unique knowledge and ways of approaching complex problems. This is a difficult objective because of the very nature of expertise. Intuition and know-how are difficult to articulate and even more difficult to teach in a training classroom. In comparison, traditional technical-training classes teach explicit knowledge: information and processes that have been identified, articulated, and captured in a way that is transferable in print and lecture. A challenge the development team faced was verifying the value proposition of the master-class concept. Unlike other initiatives in the framework that affected a majority of the upstream workforce, the TMC concept targeted a relatively small portion of the upstream population. The TMCs focused on practitioners that showed potential for becoming the next technical experts. This is a much smaller population compared with that of other technical training programs that target all 1- to 5-year employees, or all midcareer employees. After piloting the training concept for more than a year, however, the development team collected enough data to verify the value of the TMC concept in more ways than were originally expected.

Communication en oncologie dans le cadre d’essais thérapeutiques de phase I : mise en œuvre et évaluation d’un programme de formation

Within the field of technical communication, a prominent specialization is in the area of computers. As recent graduates from technical communications programs, the authors found that their experiences as technical writers in the computer industry varied from that of their education and internships. They surveyed graduates from various technical communications programs who graduated within the last five years and who work in the Silicon Valley. It was found that there were key areas in which their education and internship experience varied from that of their first job.