Five Court Reporting Schools Receive Nearly $1.4 Million In Federal Grants

October 8, 2010 (Vienna, VA) - Four court reporting programs from across the United States recently learned that they were the recipients of U.S. Department of Education funding of just under $1 million, funds that were aside to support the Realtime Writers Act for the 2010 fiscal year. The schools that received funding are the College of Court Reporting in Hobart, Indiana, which received $238,000; West Valley College in Saratoga, California, which received $262,838; Clark State Community College in Springfield, Ohio, which received $268,454; and Midstate College in Peoria, Illinois, which received $220,754. Each of the four schools is an NCRA-certified program and was selected in a competitive process that included submissions by more than 20 court reporting programs nationwide. The grants will be used to expand and improve upon the court reporting and realtime writing programs offered within these programs. In addition to funds secured through the Realtime Writers Act, a fifth school, the NCRA-certified American Institute of Business (AIB) of Des Moines, Iowa, received $400,000 of funding as a result of its own separate pursuit of federal earmarks to support its realtime education.

For nearly a decade, NCRA has conducted a sustained legislative campaign in pursuit of legislation that ultimately would become the Training for Realtime Writers Act. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 created a 2006 deadline for all new English broadcasting to be fully captioned. The deadline passed, but, at the time, it was determined what was really needed was a larger number of trained realtime writers to keep up with demand. That led to NCRA's pursuit of the Training for Realtime Writers Act, which now will help to fill the demand and bring captioning and CART services to the approximately 30 million deaf and hard-of-hearing Americans.

In a process that took more than eight years and included several legislative cycles, NCRA secured nearly $14 million through 32 different earmarks to help court reporting schools expand and train more realtime writers. Recently, the number of students graduating from court reporting programs has increased, and the funding from NCRA's efforts and the passage of the Training for Realtime Writers Act has played a significant role.

Through NCRA's consistent presence in the legislative process, the federal government recognized the necessary services that realtime writers provide this country. By providing captioning and Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART), realtime court reporters who work as broadcast captioners are able to assist deaf and hard-of-hearing citizens in receiving information and entertainment from television programming that most people take for granted. They also are able to view emergency alert messages and engage in general educational and civic activities that otherwise would not be available to them were it not for the efforts of realtime court reporters. NCRA's efforts and the skills of these providers continue to make a difference in their lives every day.

Reported by NCRA Online.