Portland Public Schools: PPS Celebrates International Translation Day

Press release from Portland Public Schools:

September 30, 2021

Dear Families, Students and Colleagues, 

On September 30, translators, interpreters, terminologists, and linguists around the world celebrate International Translation Day.

For the first time in our history, the PPS Board of Education unanimously proclaimed September 30 as International Translation Day in PPS. This momentous occasion recognizes the language access professionals who facilitate communication and outreach, disseminate the right information to families, and promote understanding between people speaking different languages. We also acknowledge their contributions to ensuring our multilingual communities have access to vital public health information during this global pandemic. 

As someone who has always interacted with other languages and cultures while growing up in Mexico, this day -- and recognition by the PPS Board --  is deeply personal. Being an immigrant to the U.S. has given me the opportunity to experience the challenges of living in a new country firsthand: the need to learn new ways of doing things, not fully grasping what is happening, getting denied professional advancement or experiences because my credentials aren’t “American,” and not having a network of people to help out. But being an immigrant and multilingual has also afforded me endless opportunities to experience and become friends with people from different countries, backgrounds, cultures and linguistic groups, who, like me, are making a positive impact in the communities we now call home.

I truly believe that language access is an important ingredient to creating better outcomes for our linguistically diverse students. As a team, the PPS Language Access Department recognizes that languages are complex, with their own identity and history. It is this reason that we constantly strive to do better, improve our practices and develop new, innovative approaches to getting in front of you, our families. I am proud of our day-to-day work, but also of some incredible work led by the team:

As the head of language access, I speak for my team in writing what an honor it is to amplify the voices and get vital information to our linguistically diverse families, creating meaningful and powerful connections between our families and schools. On this special day, I want to thank Alex, Anna, Ariel, Carmen, Eli, Jingjing, Netsanet, Olga, Pam, Quy, Riyaleh, Teng, Thach, ThanhHa and Yvonne. Together, you help make the schooling experiences of more than 10,000 linguistically diverse students speaking more than 110 languages across the district.

Lastly, I just want to thank the PPS Board of Education for its commitment to our linguistically diverse community and for celebrating our community’s diversity. It means so much to people like me to be seen and honored by our school system.

I hope you join me in celebrating our language access team and the rich linguistic diversity at PPS. 

Forward Together,

Marifer SagerHead of the Language Access Portland Public Schools

This press release was produced by Portland Public Schools. The views expressed here are the author’s own.