March - National Court Reporters Association

MARCH 2010
JCR
32 W
ireless Realtime — Is It for You?
50 N
CRA Defends Officials Against ER
54 M
aking Things Better
57 M
eet an Accessibility Advocate
www.NCRAonline.org
Reporting U.S. Veterans’ Stories I Response to Audio White Paper I Making Things Better
PAGE 44
M A R C H 2010
JCR
PUBLISHED BY
NCRA
FOR THE
REPORTING
AND
CAPTIONING
PROFESSIONS
NCRA
Job History enhancement due date assignment (manually or automatically) with a
visual indicator showing when job is due. Assign a “due date” to your job that displays in
Detailed List view or in the Job History. Don’t depend on your calendar to keep track of
jobs when you can have Job Manager display it in the context of all your work. Don’t miss
a deadline because you forgot when a job is due.
Search File Contents in transcripts as well as dictionaries to find something even
when you don’t know where it is. Looking for the date of a defendant’s hearing? Just
search for the defendant’s name and you’ll get right to it. Running across a name that
you’ve heard (and misspelled) but don’t know which depo to look it? Just search all files
as once for part of the name. Double-click on this list to go right to the occurrence
either in the transcript or the dictionary.
Transcript Brief It analyzes any previously written transcript. Even if you didn’t write
realtime or use Brief It, you can still get some great brief suggestions or reminders for
your next job or case. See briefs that you can consider using next time you’re on
the same case to reduce strokes and improve accuracy.
Text List Brief It analyzes plain text files to suggest briefs for words or phrases that
you anticipate writing in future jobs or cases. Get a core list from another
transcript, dictionary, another reporter or any other document and see what Brief It
can create for you . . . based on your writing style . . . and guaranteed not to be in conflict
with other dictionary entries.
Cat Scratch Pane is a virtual scratch pad for an at-a-glance list of things you want to
remember during or after a job. Maybe you want to make a quick note of a term or name
that you didn’t get earlier. It’s also good for noting witness names so you can easily locate
them for read back. It’s helpful for collecting names for the appearance page when you
didn’t get a business card. Anything you normally write on a sticky note is now
virtual and won’t get separated from the job sheet like sticky notes often do.
Major enhancements to Seating Chart, including Seating Chart Scope (wouldn’t it
be nice not to have to recreate the chart for the next job in the same case?)
Customize a Default Seating Chart so it comes up the way you like it every time. Set
speaker item transparency by using a convenient slider bar for more or less transparent
views. Auto Hide Speakers to set your preference for Speaker Items to hide when not
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FEATURES
March 2010 I Volume 71, No. 5
44
50
54
44
50
54
Reporting U.S. Veterans’ Stories
NCRA Defends
Officials
Against Paper
Recommending
ER
What Can We Do
to Make Things
Better?
Preserving history may often be an overlooked
part of a court reporter’s job. But some events,
such as the Veterans History Day put on by one
court reporting college, reinforce the lasting and
important role the written word plays in our lives.
By M. Jane Weingart
NCRA refuted a white
paper by the association
of court administrators
that recommends a
reckless approach
to making the court
record, which will
endanger the
integrity of the
legal system.
When it comes to
making things better,
we can respond as a
group – but we can
also respond on an
individual basis each
day. Here are one
reporter’s thoughts.
By Mary Anne Cassel Meyer
By SueLynn Morgan
Cover design by
Norasack Design, Alexandria, Va.
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | MARCH 2 0 1 0
5
DEPARTMENTS
9
President’s Page
27
11
NCRA and You
Reaching the Masses
12
In Your Association
16
Letters to the Editor
42
Crossword
62Classifieds
69
Welcome to NCRA
70
Calendar
73NCRA List of Certified
and Participating Court
Reporter Training
Programs
Court Reporter Listings
76
How Shall They Hear?
By Pat Gardiner and Julie Poenitsch
28
Beyond the Comfort Zone
A Number of Firsts
By Monette Benoit
30
In Your Own Words
In the Mind of a CART Provider
Production Manager
[email protected]
Marilyn Dent
Advertising Coordinator
[email protected]
Norasack Design
32
Tech Report
Design Consultant
[email protected]
Wireless Realtime — Is It for You?
Volunteer
Contributors
94NCRA Products and
Services
Search Like an Expert
By Dharmesh Shah
33
Tech Report
The Last Page
Desiree Hurlocker
Technology
Tech Tips
98
Editor
[email protected]
33
Joining NCRA
Jacqueline Schmidt
Ashely Frazier
By Sandy Bunch Vanderpol
96 Senior Director of Marketing & Communications
[email protected]
By Tess Crowder
Ad Index
Jim Cudahy
93Certified Legal Video
Specialists Listings
95 JCR Staff
Un-Wired: Systems to Control the
Wires in Your Life
By Marybeth Everhart
35
Technology News
Production/Communications Assistant
[email protected]
Deanna P. Baker, RMR, FAPR
Captioning Editor
[email protected]
Monette Benoit, B.Ba., CRI, CPE
Beyond the Comfort Zone
[email protected]
Candis Bradshaw
Technology Editor
[email protected]
Renee Cohen, BA, RPR
Contributing Editor
[email protected]
Tess Crowder, RPR, CRR, CBC, CCP
CART Editor
[email protected]
Certifications
18
Speed Contest
Business
230 Legal Opinion Material
36
You, Inc.
19
On Words
Networking: Is It Worth the Cost?
Contributing Editor
[email protected]
Coordinate Adjectives
By Darlene Pickard
Pat Gardiner, CRI
By Margie Wakeman Wells
20
Glossary
37
In Business
Bankruptcy Basics
Choose a Structure
23
Newly Certified
39
Management
Registered Diplomate Reporters
Maximize Your Time
Contributing Editor
[email protected]
By Joelle Jay, PH.D.
Elizabeth Huber Berry, RPR
Registered Merit Reporters
Registered Professional Reporters
Briefs
Certified Realtime Reporters
57
Q&A
Certified Broadcast Captioners
Accessibility Advocate
Certified CART Providers
By Deanna P. Baker
Certified Managers of Reporting Services
58
Media Watch
Contributing Editor
[email protected]
Reporting
58
Ethics
Aimee Suhie, BA, RPR
26
Student Reporting
Holding Transcripts Hostage
By Michael R. Brentano
Linda Evenson
Scoping Editor
[email protected]
Marybeth Everhart, RPR, CRI
How Shall They Hear
[email protected]
Vicki Hartmetz, RPR, CMRS, CPE
Contributing Editor
[email protected]
Nancy Hopp, BA, RDR, CRR, CMRS
Contributing Editor
[email protected]
Deborah Kriegshauser
CLVS Editor
[email protected]
Keith Lemons, RPR, CRR
Technology Editor
[email protected]
Mary Anne Meyer, RDR, CRR
Contributing Editor
[email protected]
The Two Most Important Lessons
By Molly Sasajima
Identification Statements
Journal of Court Reporting (ISSN 1057-5847) is published monthly (except bimonthly November/December and July/August) by the National Court
Reporters Association, 8224 Old Courthouse Road, Vienna, VA 22182-3808, 703-556-6272. Periodicals postage paid at Vienna, VA, and additional
mailing offices. Subscription ($69) is included in annual membership dues paid by a member. Subscription rate for libraries, schools, institutions, and
nonreporters, $69. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to JOURNAL OF COURT REPORTING, 8224 Old Courthouse Road, Vienna, VA 22182-3808.
Statements of fact, opinion, and all advertisements are solely the responsibility of the author or advertiser alone and do not express the opinion or
endorsement of NCRA or anyone connected with NCRA. Copyright 2009 by the National Court Reporters Association. Materials may not be reproduced
without written permission. Address all correspondence concerning content of the magazine to the editor, all correspondence regarding membership
and subscriptions to the membership director, and all advertising correspondence to the advertising coordinator.
6
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
Publishing Policy Statement
The Journal of Court Reporting has two
complementary purposes: to communicate the
activities, goals, and mission of its publisher,
the National Court Reporters Association; and,
simultaneously, to seek out and publish diverse
information and views on matters significantly
related to the court reporting and captioning
professions. All opinions expressed herein are
strictly those of the authors or advertisers unless
they are specifically identified as NCRA policy.
See Page 67
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2/10
PRESIDENT’S PAGE
Seizing the Momentum of Public
Debate
BY SUELYNN MORGAN
O
n the heels of my recent letter that rebuts a white paper
issued by the Conference of State Court Administrators,
I had the opportunity to attend both the National Association for Court Management conference in Colorado
Springs, Colo., and the NCRA’s own Firm Owners’ Conference in Orlando, Fla.
The COSCA issue is addressed sufficiently elsewhere in this
edition, so let me focus my space on something that’s been on my
mind of late, which is more of a general direction that our Association and our profession must take in the months ahead. And
I say “months” because, with the rapid pace we’re receiving news
from official reporters on the ground in Utah, Minnesota, Iowa,
Connecticut, and seemingly another state every couple of days,
with severe state budget cuts occurring everywhere, the need for
NCRA to dedicate resources toward educating key influencers
about the benefits of the stenographic reporter never has been
more important.
While at the Firm Owners’ Conference, we had many opportunities to engage with the principals of the most successful court reporting agencies in the world. As an official reporter myself — by
far the minority within NCRA compared with the overwhelming
number of freelance reporters — I felt an urgent need to convey
to the audience the importance of our rebuttal of the COSCA
paper and connect the dots of how a continued siege on official
reporters ultimately will cross over to affect the freelance side of
the business. This group was already there. Not only were the firm
owners in attendance highly engaged with the particular issue, it
wasn’t a sell of any sort to get them to see the transcendent value
of protecting official reporters. (It isn’t hard to see why this group
is so successful.)
The conference was a breath of fresh air for
me in that it served as a reminder of at least
three important concepts:
1. When provided with a true opportunity to
compete on a free-market basis with alternative
methods, the recognition of the stenographic
method as the gold standard for capturing the
court record remains entrenched among our
core constituencies.
2. There is no shortage of demand for stenographic reporters out there in the marketplace.
I can’t tell you how many firm owners let me
know that business is good and they’re eager to
hire more reporters.
3. There is not a line of any variety that divides official reporters from freelance reporters.
While certainly we operate in different envi-
ronments and certainly we deal with some different challenges on
a day-to-day basis, when it comes to moving the profession forward, we don’t have to create a connection — it’s already there.
But we do need to do more to leverage this connection and to
harness the full capabilities of our membership to carry our message to the legal community and beyond.
That brings me back to my original point, which is that the
next several months are a critical time for our profession and our
Association. One of the strategic priorities for NCRA at this point
is to do what is possible and necessary to save official reporters’
jobs. Another strategic priority is to build a more robust marketing and communications function with the capability of building a
wider awareness and appreciation for the role of the stenographic
reporter in the courtroom, in the deposition room, and throughout our society.
Are these ambitious goals? You bet. Do we have the resources,
the will, and the drive to pull them off as a collective unit? I have
no doubt.
In the coming months, we will come to you with tools and
ideas that you can use in a proactive effort to seize the momentum
of public debate in favor of court reporters. We likewise will ask
all members to work as foot soldiers in carrying our message to
clients — to your judges and court administrators, to attorneys,
and to those in your community who need to know the important ways stenographic reporters impact the legal system and their
communities at large.
It’s not feasible for NCRA and the court reporting profession
to invest tens or hundreds of million dollars in a publicity campaign. And we don’t have to do that. We have 18,000 court reporters within our ranks, each of whom touches one part of the
constituencies we need to reach. It’s time to
take the message to the streets. I hope you’re
ready for the challenge this will entail. It’s time
to put the collective power of NCRA members
and our profession to work.
SueLynn Morgan, RPR, is NCRA’s current president.
She can be reached at [email protected].
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
9
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NCRA AND YOU
There Are Lessons to Be Learned ...
Even from a Bad White Paper
BY MARK GOLDEN
T
he Conference of State Court Administrators’ white paper
on “Digital Recording,” (as well as NCRA President SueLynn Morgan’s vigorous response on behalf of stenographic
reporters) has caused quite a stir. (See more on page 54.)
The process COSCA employed to generate the report (behind closed doors and refusing any input from experts who might
disagree with their conclusions) was as controversial as its recommendations: that courts move toward an entirely audio form of
the record as the de facto standard in all courts.
As justifiably outraged as NCRA members were by the
COSCA white paper, the views it expressed were, unfortunately,
not isolated or particularly extreme. It was merely a more blunt
expression of attitudes and trends the profession has been facing
with increasing intensity for decades.
NCRA and its state associations will continue leveraging relationships forged over many years with other juridical associations
to both respond to the COSCA paper and push for a more balanced and objective approach to solving courts’ valid concerns
about budget and productivity.
The poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe once remarked: “Our
friends show us what we can do; our enemies show us what we
must do.” What can we learn from the COSCA paper about what
the stenographic reporting community must do to protect the future of the official reporter?
The COSCA paper cites the shortage of qualified reporters as
an argument for shifting to digital audio. NCRA clearly needs to
continue its efforts to strengthen our schools and student recruitment
— efforts ranging from working directly with schools to improve
their performance, securing federal funds to invest in realtime
training, career promotion activities, and ongoing Total Immersion Pilot Program.
The COSCA report also underlines the
need to swell the ranks of certified reporters. As a
profession, we need to build a united front that
says: “Steno is here to stay, we hold ourselves
to the highest standards, and we can (and
will) meet your needs better.” Nothing would
say that in a more conspicuous way than an
increase in the number of stenographic reporters who can back up their claims of proficiency
with the RPR, CRR, and other certifications.
To help get this done, NCRA has already increased the availability of RPR written knowledge testing opportunities. We are increasing
skills testing from twice a year by adding a third
skills test in as many sites as possible this summer. The Board and Council of the Academy of
Professional Reporters (CAPR) are also implementing a limited
amnesty program to encourage qualified stenographic reporters
whose credentials have lapsed to reinstate.
The COSCA paper itself gives lip service to the importance of
professional certification. Unfortunately, though, the abundance
of certifications can lead decision-makers to reach the fallacious
conclusion that any set of initials after a reporter’s, recorder’s, or
transcriptionist’s name is a guarantee of his or her skills, knowledge, and ethics. We know that not all certifications are created
equal. Are the tests constructed under the stringent requirements
of independent testing authorities to assure consistency and validity? Are they backed up by continuing education requirements?
One of the items we challenged in the COSCA paper was its
claim that “the Utah court system reduced the number of days
from a transcript request to production from 138 to 16 by implementing digital recording.” But even if the difference in production time is much smaller, if we are to respond effectively to our
opponents’ arguments, we need to understand it from their perspective. There are plenty of reasonable explanations for why a stenographic reporter, with all the additional courtroom duties they
routinely perform, could take longer to complete a transcript than
a transcriptionist who faces no obligations other than transcript
production. But from the court’s perspectives, it doesn’t matter.
They are concerned with reducing court docket times and
eliminating delays. Stenographic reporters need to be their allies
in accomplishing this. That means helping your fellow reporters
if they are falling behind on transcript production, holding each
other accountable, and making every reporter aware that just one
reporter’s subpar performance could prove fatal to every reporter
in the system.
And, ultimately, what the COSCA paper tells us is that changes
are imminent. But even if official positions, as
traditionally defined, are reduced or eliminated, there are new and possibly even better professional opportunities for steno in the future.
We just need to define them. What are the untapped opportunities to expand and maximize
the utility, value, and need for stenographic
reporters in the U.S. courts? What advantages
do stenographic reporters possess in securing
such assignments? What vulnerabilities do we
face from competing alternatives? The NCRA
Board of Directors and Technology Evaluation
Committee have been devoting a lot of time
and attention to those questions recently, and
you can expect to hear more about that in
these pages in the near future.
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
11
IN YOUR ASSOCIATION
NCRA Will Begin Testing Nonmember Steno Reporters Later This Year
In February, the NCRA Board of Directors approved a
resolution that will allow the organization to begin testing nonmember stenographic reporters beginning later this year. The
policy change still will require reporters to join NCRA upon
passing the RPR exam and otherwise adhere to the conditions of
holding the RPR credential, such as fulfillment of the three-year,
3.0 CEU requirement.
NCRA also will continue studying the concept of expanding on the concept to allow nonmember stenographic reporters
to not just take certification exams but also hold NCRA-issued
credentials on a permanent basis. Such a scenario would compel nonmembers to fulfill the same CEU requirement, pay an annual recertification fee, and abide by other conditions of holding
NCRA-issued credentials. While the rationale behind testing of
nonmember steno reporters is to expand the universe of reporters
holding certification, a change of the magnitude that would allow
nonmembers to hold the RPR credential without holding membership most certainly would need buy-in from members. 2010 Annual Convention Is Chicago Bound
Be sure to mark your calendar for August 5–8 when NCRA’s
Annual Convention and Exposition will be held at the Hilton
Chicago. NCRA members have always loved Chicago and a large
attendance is expected. Our theme, “Striving for New Heights,”
will set the stage for seminars, workshops, social events, a state-ofthe-art equipment exposition, and surprises that will both delight
and inspire you. Registration and convention details will be available in May at www.NCRAonline.org, as well as in the June issue
of the JCR.
Upcoming Testing
Written Knowledge Test: The next RPR, RMR, RDR, CBC,
CCP, and CLVS written knowledge tests will be held April 5–17,
2010, at more than 200 Pearson VUE Professional Centers. Registration for the April exams is March 1–31, 2010. Candidates can
register online at www.NCRAonline.org/testing.
Skills Test: The next RPR, RMR, CRR, CBC, and CCP skills
tests will be held on May 1, 2010, at NCRA-sponsored testing
sites. Registration for the May exams is March 1–31, 2010. Candidates can register online at www.NCRAonline.org/testing.
NCRA officers and directors
OFFICERS
DIRECTORS
SueLynn Morgan, RPR
President
Kimi George, RMR
Comanche County Courthouse
315 SW Fifth St., #506
Lawton, OK 73501
580-581-4581
[email protected]
[email protected]
Melanie Humphrey-Sonntag, RDR,
CRR, FAPR
President-Elect
248 West River Dr.
St. Charles, IL 60174
630-232-0262
[email protected]
R. Douglas Friend, RMR, CRR
Vice President
1001 SW 5th Ave., #1200
Portland, OR 97204
503-228-7201
[email protected]
Jason Meadors, RPR, CRR
Secretary-Treasurer
417 West Mountain Ave.
Fort Collins, CO 80521
970-482-1506
[email protected]
Karen Yates, RPR, CRR, CCP, CBC
Immediate Past President
2656 Wade St.
Minden, NV 89423
775-267-2257
[email protected]
12
P.O. Box 721378
Oklahoma City, OK 73172-1378
405-824-7653
[email protected]
Shirley Ann Hall, RDR, CRR, CBC,
CRI, CPE
6260 USPO & Courthouse
700 Grant St., Rm. 6260
Pittsburgh, PA 15219
412-765-0408
[email protected]
Judith Lehman, RMR, CRI, CSR
R.R. 4, Box 12
Shelbyville, IL 62565
217-254-9090
[email protected]
Adam D. Miller, RPR, CRI
NCRA corporate partners
Mark Renzi, RPR
Golden Crest Corporate Ctr.
2277 State Hwy. 33, #410
Trenton, NJ 08690-1700
609-989-9199
[email protected]
Tammie A. Shedd, RPR, CMRS,
FAPR
8930 Glenbrook Rd.
Fairfax, VA 22031
703-280-0040
tammie.shedd@visualaudio
captioning.com
Tami Smith, RPR, CPE, CSR
5935 Stoney Pt.
Lansing, MI 48917
269-969-6504
[email protected]
Service Provider
Nancy C. Varallo, RDR, CRR
321 Ellenwood Dr.
Middletown, DE 19709-7867
302-449-0529
[email protected]
9 Hammond St.
Worcester, MA 01610
508-753-9286
Nancy.Varallo@courtreporting
mgt.com
Sarah E. Nageotte, RMR, CRR, CBC
EX OFFICIO
335 Susan Dr.
Jefferson, OH 44047
440-862-1985
[email protected]
NCRA’s Corporate
Partners Program
brings together ­vendors,
service ­providers, and
NCRA Members
with the common goals of promoting, advancing, and strengthening the
reporting and captioning professions.
Mark J. Golden, CAE
Executive Director and Chief
Executive Officer
8224 Old Courthouse Rd.
Vienna, VA 22182-3808
703-556-6272
[email protected]
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
NCRA Mission Statement
NCRA promotes excellence
among those who capture and
convert the spoken word to text
and is committed to supporting every member in achieving
the highest level of professional
expertise.
IN YOUR ASSOCIATION
NCRA REFUTES UTAH SUPREME
COURT
The following is a press release sent to
Utah newspapers regarding Utah’s Chief
Justice stating that transcript production has
declined greatly with the introduction of audio recording in the courts. NCRA President
SueLynn Morgan wrote this letter to alert
Utah citizens to the incorrect information
and ask that it be corrected.
Last summer, when official court reporters from Utah’s district courts were
dismissed in favor of digital audio recording systems, the stated reason for the
change was that such a change would
save the courts money. A few weeks
ago, the chief justice of Utah’s Supreme
Court, the Hon. Christine Durham, said
in comments to legislators that a positive
result of the change was that transcript
production had been reduced from 138
days to 16 through the introduction of
audio recording to the courts. That statistic is simply incorrect.
If it truly takes a stenographic court
reporter 138 days, on average, to produce a transcript from a court proceedings when the expected turnaround time,
upon request, is 30 days, that reporter
should be dismissed, end of story. But
that was not the problem in Utah.
No doubt, this wasn’t Chief Justice
Durham’s egregious error, but that of the
appeals courts and/or Utah’s Administrative Office of the Courts. Nonetheless,
by repeating the error, the chief justice
unwittingly was an accomplice to a major unnecessary insult against the official
court reporters. These reporters tell an
entirely different story, backed up by actual facts. “I have years’ worth of invoices
from the First and Second District Courts
that show the actual number of days it
took to get a transcript prepared from
the time the payment arrangements were
made until completion, and it is nowhere
close to what the AOC is reporting,” said
Laurie Shingle, one of the official court
reporters who lost their jobs in Utah. “I
can remember only three times in the last
few years that we needed to ask for an
extension beyond 30 days, so only three
times in that period did it take us more
than 30 days to prepare a transcript.”
Chief Justice Durham should acknowledge the error and retract her
statement. You might ask how could
the AOC or the appeals court miss the
number of days it took official reporters
to produce a transcript in such monumental fashion. For starters, the appeals
court almost certainly did not take into
account the fact that, under the system
the official reporters worked, the courts
did not permit the reporters to begin
working on a transcript until the courts
had collected payment for those transcripts from third parties. At best, the
appeals court is comparing apples to oranges — the time it takes a typist to prepare a transcript from an audio file once
he or she gets started; meanwhile the
court reporter is held accountable even
for the time during which they were not
permitted to transcribe by the court.
There is no possible way that typists are
producing a transcript from an audio file
faster than a stenographic court reporter.
Two more important points need emphasis with this situation. Even before
the official reporters were dismissed last
summer, nearly all of the proceedings in
district courts already were using digital
audio; official reporters were used only
on first-degree felony trials. Second, the
official reporters were dismissed as of last
July, meaning, at best, the appeals courts
were using only four months’ worth of
data, an amount of time that doesn’t rise
to anything resembling a trend or a fact.
That hardly matters, though, because
the data is entirely incorrect.
If all this makes you wonder if the
same people responsible for producing
and promulgating such blatantly false
data are capable of making wise decisions with regard to who should hold the
responsibility of making the court record
and thus playing a key role to ensure the
integrity of the judicial process …well …
you’re not alone.
SueLynn Morgan, RPR, is the president
of the National Court Reporters Association.
HOW TO GET INSIDE
YOUR ASSOCIATION
We offer several convenient ways
for members and others to contact
the headquarters office:
Headquarters address
8224 Old Courthouse Road
Vienna, VA 22182-3808
Main telephone number
703-556-6272
Main fax number
703-556-6291
Internet address
www.NCRAonline.org
Member Services and
Information Center
Toll-free: 800-272-6272
Internet e-mail
[email protected]
Twitter
@NCRA
Facebook
NCRAonline.org/facebook
Linked ink
NCRAonline.org/facebook-linkedin
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13
IN YOUR ASSOCIATION
look for announcements of more presentations. If you have a contact in a
law school or want to present a session
on “Making the Record” to law firms or
judges, contact B.J. Shorak at NCRF on
800-272-6272, ext. 126, or at bjshorak@
ncrahq.org. NCRF has created a detailed
course outline, a PowerPoint, and some
handouts, which are available at no cost.
Macomb Community College
Mini Campus Convention
Fourth Partner Signs on with
NCRF Oral Histories Program
NCRA’s Education Department held
its second campus mini-convention on
January 16th, at Macomb Community
College in Warren, Mich., and it was another unequivocal success. Forty students,
several with parents and significant others in tow, came to attend a great line-up
of seminars, meet with vendors, and learn
more about the profession.
Circuit Court Judge Matthew Switalski, a strong proponent of keeping stenographic reporters in the courtroom, was
the keynote speaker. There were seminars
on how the brain works and performing
under stress; freelance reporting; CART
and captioning; dictionary building; and
a session by Board director Tami Smith
and USCRA representative Andrea Wabeke on the value of networking and being involved in your state and national
associations. Four vendors exhibited and
answered student questions throughout
the day — Stenograph, Eclipse, ProCat,
and Dictionary Jumpstart. During the
box luncheon, the students enjoyed a
fashion show on professional dress. Drawings were held throughout the day, with
students receiving door prizes donated
by NCRA, vendors, and by the Michigan
state association.
NCRF is pleased to announce its
fourth Oral Histories Program partner, the
Sullivan Brothers Iowa Veterans Museum,
one of five museums comprising the Grout
Museum District in Waterloo, Iowa. They
are a participating member of the Library
of Congress’ Veterans History Project and
have a collection of more than 800 video
interviews. They have requested NCRF’s
assistance in transcribing 200 of them.
NCRF Legal Ed Program Up
and Running
The East Coast snowstorms didn’t stop
NCRF’s Legal Education Program! In
January, Kevin Hunt kicked off NCRF’s
program to educate law students about
“Making the Record” and presented the
information to litigation students in their
final year at the University of Buffalo Law
School. In February, Bill Weber gave the
presentation at a class on “Introduction
to Electronic Discovery and Evidence,”
at the Georgetown University Law Center
conducted by Professor Ron Hedges.
More than 35 people have contacted
NCRF with interest in this program, so
14
means we need to receive about ten per
week from here on out. Need CEUs? You
receive a free point one (.1) CEU for each
history transcribed. Are you a student and
want a free NCRA student membership?
Transcribe two histories, and NCRF pays
your dues! Contact Beth Kilker at NCRF
for details on 800-272-6272, ext. 174, or
at [email protected].
NCRA 2010
2,010 by Memorial Day 2010
NCRF has submitted more than 1,900
completed transcripts of veterans’ histories to the Library of Congress to date, and
we have committed to reaching a goal of at
least 2,010 by Memorial Day 2010, which
FOR
Annual Convention & Exposition
August 5–8, 2010 Chicago, IL
NCRF Commits to 2,010 by May 2010
NCRF needs your help! We have committed to reaching
a goal of transcribing at least two thousand and ten veterans’
histories by this Memorial Day; that’s 2,010 by May 31, 2010!
We have submitted more than1,900 completed transcripts to
the Library of Congress so far, and that’s wonderful! So many
reporters and students have participated. With about 12 weeks
left to our deadline, we need to do about ten per week, and we
can do it!
Need CEUs? RPRs get point one (.1) CEU for each CD
transcribed, and there’s no fee! RPRs can receive up to 1.0
CEU this way.
Are you a student and want a free NCRA student membership? Transcribe two oral histories, and NCRF will pay one
year of your NCRA dues!
It can’t be much easier than that. Help preserve America’s history and the poignant stories of service men and women who serve our country and keep us safe.
Yes, you’ll receive CEUs or a free NCRA student membership, but your real reward
will be in learning what brave men and women have done for you and for our country and in knowing that you are creating a permanent record for posterity.
Contact Beth Kilker, NCRF’s Oral Histories Program Coordinator, to sign up
now! Help NCRF meet its goal of 2,010 by Memorial Day 2010. You won’t regret it.
Beth can be reached at 800-272-6272, ext. 174, or by e-mail at [email protected].
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Janet A. Hamilton, RDR
NCRF Trustee
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
When Stenographer Turns to
Voicewriting
M
y wife, Tina, has been a reporter for 21 years. This total includes her work right up to the present day, even
though she has not written professionally on her machine for six years. In 2003, Tina began experiencing a
neurological problem in her left hand that caused her
middle finger to involuntarily rise up from the keyboard and not
respond quickly or accurately while writing. Her condition was
diagnosed as Focal Hand Dystonia, a movement disorder in the
same family as Parkinson’s, but one that is not debilitating and a
condition that would be little more than an annoyance if she were
not a court reporter.
Despite our 30 years together, 25 of them married, I confess
that I didn’t immediately understand why no longer being able
to report was such a blow to Tina. For my part, upon learning
that this condition is not painful, life-threatening, or progressive, I moved quickly into trying to help Tina research and decide
on other professional options toward which she could direct her
skills, education, experience, and work ethic. It would take several months (Tina might say even longer) for me to truly understand the nature of her loss from her perspective and what being
a reporter means to her.
By the time of her diagnosis, Tina had earned most of the reporting credentials available at the time, including achieving the
RDR certification in 1997. Given her level of commitment to the
profession, it was only natural that she would seek to learn about
voice reporting and the National Verbatim Reporters Association
as a means of continuing to be involved in the work she loved
and in which she excelled. While Tina certainly anticipated that
significant effort would be required to become a competent, realtime voice reporter, she was not prepared for the exceedingly difficult journey from sidelined machine writer to competent voice
reporter.
The first significant hurdle she encountered was the lack of
well-designed voicewriting training programs in which she could
enroll. While she did find a few online programs, designed and
administered by voice writers, she was unable to find a reputable,
college-level training program using proven pedagogies to help
her make the switch from machine to voice.
With few options for training, Tina did enroll in an online
course that turned out to have a thin curriculum, marginal online
support, and inconsistent follow-up and response to e-mail and
phone queries. Beyond the lack of curriculum and infrastructure
to support her learning, however, it turns out that mastering the
skills needed to become a competent voice reporter may well be as
difficult as mastering machine stenography. As an educator who
has designed and taught online graduate-level courses, I know
that the “program” my wife enrolled in was simply inadequate to
teach, at a distance, the precise skills needed to master the use of
16
the stenomask, the primary tool that makes live voice reporting
possible.
Despite this significant obstacle, my wife has made significant
progress as she essentially teaches herself voicewriting. While she
is still some distance away from being able to write a live deposition, hearing, or court trial, she has made enough progress in
voicewriting using “open mike” dictation that she is now producing a significant number of pages for the freelance firm she works
for by transcribing an increasing number of recorded voice files
that come into the firm as CDs, DVDs, or .wav files.
Perhaps the biggest obstacle that Tina didn’t anticipate was
the stubborn resistance of machine writers to embrace new input
technologies as legitimate ways of capturing the record. While attorneys and the legal system have been steadily eroding the foothold that reporters have had in the legal system for years now, it
has not helped that the profession has been unable to adequately
meet the demand for qualified reporters. And while I noted the
perhaps equal difficulty of learning voicewriting, the profession
would certainly be strengthened by the availability of more than
one input technology in which new reporters could be trained.
This ongoing shortage of qualified reporters will become more
acute and apparent to the public as the legal system, the broadcast
industry, colleges, and universities, and many other entities seeking to meet ADA requirements in serving their customers and
clients continue to look for transcription and captioning professionals to meet this growing demand. It is critical that NCRA and
NVRA reporters reach a mutual agreement that the critical issue
at stake in the debate is the availability of skilled reporters and
captioners who can competently utilize today’s input technologies
to create an accurate record. Furthermore, leaders from these two
traditions in reporting must also commit themselves to incorporating any future technology that enhances a reporter’s ability to
capture an accurate record.
Voice and machine writers will also need to work together to
promote the profession to future generations of tech-savvy young
people who would enjoy the same challenges and rewards of the
reporting profession just as many current and past reporters have.
In the face of all the current and potential legal, business, governmental, educational, religious, and ADA-related reporting needs
out there, I simply do not believe that this important profession
is as close to death as has been repeatedly suggested. This promotion of the profession will also have to include strengthening and
expanding the network of available, high-quality educational options to train this next generation of reporters.
In fairness and gratitude, I must acknowledge several individuals who have been empathetic and encouraging of my wife over
the past six years. Chief among these colleagues has been Linda
Sturm, owner of Professional Reporters, Inc., in Columbus, Ohio.
Linda is an excellent reporter and a firm believer in the importance of technical innovation in the reporting profession. More
importantly to me, however, Linda has been an incomparable
source of support for Tina for which I will be forever grateful. Tina
has also been encouraged by several voice reporters who have
reached out to her as she has begun networking within NVRA.
The written word in print and electronic form sits firmly in
the center of most American work and leisure pursuits. And
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
while much of what people are talking
about these days is of questionable longterm value, there is no question that we’re
printing and posting more of the spoken
word than ever before. Court reporting is
the profession that currently defines and
sets the standard for the accurate transcription of the spoken word and for the
training of the reporters who produce the
written record. Maintaining and strengthening the role of reporters in this process
must be the primary mission of their professional association irrespective of the
technology used to produce the written
record.
The time has come for the voice and
machine traditions in reporting to “write
in one voice” to more effectively advocate for the profession, set standards for
reporter training for machine and voice
writers, encourage the current generation
of texters and talkers to consider reporting
as a profession, and to help thousands of
leaders in business, industry, law, government, education, and religion see the endless range of organizational needs that can
be met by well-trained reporters.
John W. Marr, Jr., Ph.D.
Springfield, Ohio
letters to the editor policy
The Letters to the Editor section of the magazine is meant to facilitate free and
civil debate among the readers of the magazine. If you have comments you would
like to make about topics in these pages or issues you feel are important to the community of members, please send your Letter to the Editor to JCR Editor Jacqueline
Schmidt, NCRA, 8224 Old Courthouse Rd., Vienna, VA 22182, or by e-mail to
[email protected].
We will strive to publish as many letters as possible in the pages of the JCR itself.
Should we receive more letters than there is space to publish within the pages of the
magazine, a representative sample of comments received will appear in print and a
fuller presentation will be published online. (Space available in the printed version
of the JCR for letters is limited not only by the number of letters received but also by
the volume of other materials in the remainder of the magazine.)
There may be occasions when we are unable to publish a letter to the editor or
Optimist or Pessimist?
Q. Are you married?
A. Yes.
Q. You said, first husband?
A. I have since remarried.
Q. Okay.
A. Divorced. But I can’t tell you what
year, because I can’t remember.
Q. A long time ago?
A. In the ’80s somewhere, yeah. Sorry.
Q. Back in California, then?
A. Yes.
Q. I always want to check when someone says, the first husband. It might mean
the current one. It’s the first one, they’re
just planning.
A. Oh, no.
MS. SMITH : Now, that’s cynical.
MR. JOHNSON: I actually had someone say that once, I’m still married to my
first husband.
Sherry Lindsay
Vancouver, Wash.
must insist that the author edit its content, but this is never a matter that we take
lightly. We encourage vigorous debate and the presentation of a diversity of points
of view but cannot permit the publication of materials that create exposure to potential legal liability for the author, NCRA, and/or the JCR. Items that may trigger
increased scrutiny include (but are not limited to) discussion of rates, calling for
boycotts, making libelous statements, and other matters prohibited under antitrust,
libel, or other governing laws. In these cases, there may be a need to restructure a
letter, and the editor would be happy to give guidance on how to do so.
Statements of fact and opinion contained in letters to the editor (in print or online) and within the editorial content of the magazine are and will remain solely the
responsibility of the author and do not necessarily express the opinion or endorsement of NCRA or anyone connected with NCRA.
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17
CERTIFICATIONS
S P E E D
C O N T E S T
230 Legal Opinion
Material
T
he following is the text for the 230 wpm Legal Opinion leg of the
2009 National Speed Contest which took place in August 2009
in Washington, D.C. The notes of the contestants who placed
second and third in this leg are on page 19. The notes of the firstplace winner were lost during a computer malfunction.
This case concerns the number of hours in which an employee
may labor in the bakery of an employer. The general right to make
a contract in relation to his business is part of the liberty of the
individual protected by the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.
Under that provision no state can deprive any person of life, █15
liberty, or property without due process of law.
The right to purchase or to sell labor is part of the liberty protected by this amendment, unless there are circumstances which
exclude the right. There are, however, certain powers, existing
in the sovereignty of each state in the Union, somewhat vaguely
termed police powers, the exact description and █30 limitation of
which have not been attempted by the courts.
Those powers, broadly stated, relate to the safety, health, morals, and general welfare of the public. Both property and liberty
are held on such reasonable conditions as may be imposed by the
governing power of the state in the exercise of those powers, and
with such conditions the █45 14th Amendment was not designed
to interfere.
The state, therefore, has the power to prevent the individual
from making certain kinds of contracts, and in regard to them the
Constitution offers no protection. If the contract be one which
the state, in the legitimate exercise of its police power, has the
right to prohibit, it is not █(1) prevented from prohibiting it by the
14th Amendment.
Contracts in violation of a statute or a contract to let one’s
property for immoral purposes, or to do any other unlawful act,
could obtain no protection from the Constitution, as coming under the liberty of person or of free contract. But, when the state,
by its legislature, in the █15 assumed exercise of its police powers,
has passed an act which seriously limits the right to labor or the
right of contract in regard to their means of livelihood, it becomes
of great importance to determine which shall prevail, the right
of the individual to labor for such time as he may choose or the
right of █30 the state to prevent the individual from laboring, or
from entering into any contract to labor, beyond a certain time
prescribed by the state.
This court has recognized the existence and upheld the exercise of the police powers of the states in many cases. Among
the later cases where the state law has been upheld by this court
█45 is that of Golden versus Harrison. A provision in the act of the
legislature was there under consideration, the act limiting the
employment of workmen in all underground mines or workings
to eight hours per day, except in cases of emergency, where life
or property was in imminent danger. It also limited the hours of
labor in █(2) smelting and other institutions for the reduction or refining of ores or metals to eight hours per day, except in like cases
of emergency. The act was held to be a valid exercise of the police
powers of the state.
18
A review of many of the cases on the subject, decided
by this and other courts, is given █15 in the opinion. The following citation from the observations of the supreme court in that
case was made by the judge writing the opinion of this court, and
approved: “The law in question is confined to the protection of
that class of people engaged in labor in underground mines, and in
smelters and other works wherein ores █30 are reduced and refined.
This law applies only to the classes subjected by their employment
to the peculiar conditions and effects of underground mining and
work in smelters, and other works for the reduction and refining
of ores. Therefore it is not necessary to discuss or decide whether
the legislature can fix the hours of labor in other █45 employments.”
It will be observed that, even with regard to that class of labor,
the statute provided for cases of emergency wherein the provisions of the statute would not apply. The statute now before this
court has no emergency clause in it, and, if the statute is valid,
there are no circumstances and no emergencies under which █(3)
the slightest violation of the provisions of the act would be innocent.
There is nothing in Golden versus Harrison which covers the
case now before us. It must, of course, be conceded that there
is a limit to the valid exercise of the police power by the state.
Otherwise the 14th Amendment would have no efficacy and the
█15 legislatures of the states would have unbounded power, and it
would be enough to say that any piece of legislation was enacted
to conserve the morals, the health, or the safety of the people.
The claim of the police power would be a mere pretext.
In every case that comes before this court, therefore, where
legislation of █30 this character is concerned, and where the protection of the Constitution is sought, the question necessarily
arises: Is this a fair, reasonable, and appropriate exercise of the
police power of the state, or is it an unreasonable, unnecessary,
and arbitrary interference with the right of the individual to his
personal liberty, or to enter into those contracts in █45 relation to
labor which may seem to him appropriate or necessary for the support of himself and his family? Of course the liberty of contract
relating to labor includes both parties to it. The one has as much
right to purchase labor as the other to sell it.
This is not a question of substituting the judgment █(4) of the
court for that of the legislature. If the act be within the power of
the state, it is valid, even though the judgment of the court might
be totally opposed to the enactment of such a law. The question
would still remain: Is it within the police power of the state? That
question must be answered █15 by the court.
The question whether this act is valid as a labor law, pure and
simple, may be dismissed in a few words. There is no reasonable
ground for interfering with the liberty of person or the right of free
contract, by determining the hours of labor, in the occupation of
a baker.
There is no █30 contention that bakers as a class are not equal
in intelligence and capacity to men in other trades or manual occupations, or that they are not able to assert their rights and care
for themselves without the protecting arm of the state, interfering
with their independence of judgment and of action. They are in
no sense wards of █45 the state.
Viewed in the light of a purely labor law, with no reference
whatever to the question of health, we think that a law like the
one before us involves neither the safety, the morals, nor the
welfare, of the public, and that the interest of the public is not
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CERTIFICATIONS
2nd — Mark Tod Kislingbury
3rd — Jo Ann Bryce
in the slightest degree affected by █ such
an act.
(5)
O n
W o r d s
Coordinate
Adjectives
By Margie Wakeman Wells
S
ome people are confused about
what to do with two or more adjectives that come in front of a
noun. Most often, nothing is required. Sometimes a hyphen is
required. Sometimes a comma is required
between the adjectives. Then these are
called coordinate adjectives.
Coordinate Adjectives: When two or
more adjectives come in front of a noun
and modify it with equal emphasis or equal
value, they are called coordinate adjectives.
These coordinate adjectives are separated
from each other with a comma.
For this comma to be correct, the adjectives must modify more or less the same
quality of the noun; that is, they are more
or less synonyms.
He was a genuine, down-to-earth kind of guy.
She used effective, valuable contributions.
He is a competent, efficient employee.
A test to check to see whether this
comma is correct is to reverse the order of
the adjectives. If the order is absolutely arbitrary — that is, it does not matter which
one comes first — the comma is needed.
It had been a difficult, taxing day.
It had been a taxing, difficult day.
I would say he is a handsome, attractive man.
I would say he is an attractive, handsome man.
Another way to check is to insert the
word and in between the two words. If
the words make sense and again the order
doesn’t matter, use a comma between the
two words.
He had an elegant and polished air about him.
He had a polished and elegant air about him.
He had a polished, elegant air about him.
He had an elegant, polished air about him.
Margie Wakeman Wells, CRI, has taught reporting for more than 30 years and has given
many seminars on English grammar and punctuation. Margie is currently the online education consultant for College of Court Reporting
in Hobart, Ind. Her book, Court Reporting: Bad
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
19
CERTIFICATIONS
Grammar, Good Punctuation is being published by NCRA and is available from the online
bookstore. She can be contacted at mww@
margiewakemanwells.com.
G L O S S A R Y
Bankruptcy
Basics
adversary proceeding: A lawsuit arising in or related to a bankruptcy case that
is commenced by filing a complaint with
the court. A nonexclusive list of adversary
proceedings is set forth in Fed. R. Bankr.
P. 7001.
assume: An agreement to continue
performing duties under a contract or
lease.
automatic stay: An injunction that
automatically stops lawsuits, foreclosures,
garnishments, and all collection activity
against the debtor the moment a bankruptcy petition is filed.
bankruptcy: A legal procedure for
dealing with debt problems of individuals and businesses; specifically, a case filed
under one of the chapters of title 11 of
the United States Code (the Bankruptcy
Code).
bankruptcy administrator: An officer of the judiciary serving in the judicial
districts of Alabama and North Carolina
who, like the U.S. trustee, is responsible
for supervising the administration of
bankruptcy cases, estates, and trustees;
monitoring plans and disclosure statements; monitoring creditors’ committees;
monitoring fee applications; and performing other statutory duties. Compare with
U.S. trustee.
Bankruptcy Code: The informal name
for title 11 of the United States Code (11
U.S.C. §§ 101-1330), the federal bankruptcy law.
bankruptcy court: The bankruptcy
judges in regular active service in each
district; a unit of the district court.
bankruptcy estate: All legal or equitable interests of the debtor in property
at the time of the bankruptcy filing. (The
estate includes all property in which the
debtor has an interest, even if it is owned
or held by another person.)
bankruptcy judge: A judicial officer of
the United States district court who is the
court official with decision-making power
over federal bankruptcy cases.
bankruptcy petition: The document
filed by the debtor (in a voluntary case)
or by creditors (in an involuntary case) by
which opens the bankruptcy case. (There
are official forms for bankruptcy petitions.)
Chapter 7: The chapter of the
Bankruptcy
Code
providing
for
“liquidation,”(i.e., the sale of a debtor’s
nonexempt property and the distribution
of the proceeds to creditors.)
Chapter 9: The chapter of the Bankruptcy Code providing for reorganization
of municipalities (which includes cities
and towns, as well as villages, counties,
taxing districts, municipal utilities, and
school districts).
Chapter 11: The chapter of the Bankruptcy Code providing (generally) for reorganization, usually involving a corpora-
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M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
CERTIFICATIONS
tion or partnership. (A chapter 11 debtor
usually proposes a plan of reorganization
to keep its business alive and pay creditors
over time. People in business or individuals can also seek relief in chapter 11.)
Chapter 12: The chapter of the Bankruptcy Code providing for adjustment of
debts of a “family farmer,” or a “family
fisherman” as those terms are defined in
the Bankruptcy Code.
Chapter 13: The chapter of the Bankruptcy Code providing for adjustment of
debts of an individual with regular income. (Chapter 13 allows a debtor to keep
property and pay debts over time, usually
three to five years.)
Chapter 15: The chapter of the Bankruptcy Code dealing with cases of crossborder insolvency.
claim: A creditor’s assertion of a right
to payment from the debtor or the debtor’s property.
confirmation: Bankruptcy judges’s approval of a plan of reorganization or liquidation in Chapter 11, or payment plan in
Chapter 12 or 13.
consumer debtor: A debtor whose
debts are primarily consumer debts.
consumer debts: Debts incurred for
personal, as opposed to business, needs.
contested matter: Those matters,
other than objections to claims, that are
disputed but are not within the definition
of adversary proceeding contained in Rule
7001.
contingent claim: A claim that may
be owed by the debtor under certain circumstances, e.g., where the debtor is a cosigner on another person’s loan and that
person fails to pay.
creditor: One to whom the debtor
owes money or who claims to be owed
money by the debtor.
credit counseling: Generally refers to
two events in individual bankruptcy cases:
(1) the “individual or group briefing” from
a nonprofit budget and credit counseling
agency that individual debtors must attend prior to filing under any chapter of
the Bankruptcy Code; and (2) the “instructional course in personal financial
management” in chapters 7 and 13 that an
individual debtor must complete before a
discharge is entered. There are exceptions
to both requirements for certain categories of debtors, exigent circumstances, or
if the U.S. trustee or bankruptcy administrator have determined that there are
insufficient approved credit counseling
agencies available to provide the necessary counseling.
creditors’ meeting: See 341 meeting.
current monthly income: The average monthly income received by the
debtor over the six calendar months before commencement of the bankruptcy
case, including regular contributions to
household expenses from nondebtors and
income from the debtor’s spouse if the petition is a joint petition, but not including
social security income and certain other
payments made because the debtor is
the victim of certain crimes. 11 U.S.C. §
101(10A).
debtor: A person who has filed a petition for relief under the Bankruptcy Code.
debtor education: See credit counseling.
defendant: An individual (or business)
against whom a lawsuit is filed.
discharge: A release of a debtor from
personal liability for certain dischargeable
debts set forth in the Bankruptcy Code.
(A discharge releases a debtor from personal liability for certain debts known
as dischargeable debts and prevents the
creditors owed those debts from taking
any action against the debtor to collect
the debts. The discharge also prohibits
creditors from communicating with the
debtor regarding the debt, including telephone calls, letters, and personal contact.)
dischargeable debt: A debt for which
the Bankruptcy Code allows the debtor’s
personal liability to be eliminated.
disclosure statement: A written document prepared by the chapter 11 debtor or
other plan proponent that is designed to
provide “adequate information” to creditors to enable them to evaluate the chapter 11 plan of reorganization.
equity: The value of a debtor’s interest in property that remains after liens and
other creditors’ interests are considered.
(Example: If a house valued at $100,000
is subject to a $80,000 mortgage, there is
$20,000 of equity.)
executory contract or lease: Generally
includes contracts or leases under which
both parties to the agreement have duties
remaining to be performed. (If a contract
or lease is executory, a debtor may assume
it or reject it.)
exemptions, exempt property: Certain property owned by an individual
debtor that the Bankruptcy Code or appli-
cable state law permits the debtor to keep
from unsecured creditors. For example, in
some states the debtor may be able to exempt all or a portion of the equity in the
debtor’s primary residence (homestead
exemption), or some or all “tools of the
trade” used by the debtor to make a living
(i.e., auto tools for an auto mechanic or
dental tools for a dentist). The availability
and amount of property the debtor may
exempt depends on the state the debtor
lives in.
family farmer or family fisherman:
An individual, individual and spouse,
corporation, or partnership engaged in a
farming or fishing operation that meets
certain debt limits and other statutory criteria for filing a petition under chapter 12.
fraudulent transfer: A transfer of a
debtor’s property made with intent to defraud or for which the debtor receives less
than the transferred property’s value.
fresh start: The characterization of a
debtor’s status after bankruptcy, i.e., free
of most debts. (Giving debtors a fresh start
is one purpose of the Bankruptcy Code.)
insider (of individual debtor): Any
relative of the debtor or of a general partner of the debtor; partnership in which
the debtor is a general partner; general
partner of the debtor; or a corporation of
which the debtor is a director, officer, or
person in control.
insider (of corporate debtor): A director, officer, or person in control of the
debtor; a partnership in which the debtor
is a general partner; a general partner of
the debtor; or a relative of a general partner, director, officer, or person in control
of the debtor.
joint administration: A court-approved mechanism under which two or
more cases can be administered together.
(Assuming no conflicts of interest, these
separate businesses or individuals can pool
their resources, hire the same professionals, etc.)
joint petition: One bankruptcy petition filed by a husband and wife together.
lien: The right to take and hold or sell
the property of a debtor as security or payment for a debt or duty.
liquidation: A sale of a debtor’s property with the proceeds to be used for the
benefit of creditors.
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CERTIFICATIONS
liquidated claim: A creditor’s claim for
a fixed amount of money.
from liquidation by the trustee to creditors.
means test: Section 707(b)(2) of the
Bankruptcy Code applies a “means test”
to determine whether an individual debtor’s chapter 7 filing is presumed to be an
abuse of the Bankruptcy Code requiring
dismissal or conversion of the case (generally to chapter 13). Abuse is presumed if
the debtor’s aggregate current monthly income (see definition above) over 5 years,
net of certain statutorily allowed expenses
is more than (i) $10,950, or (ii) 25% of the
debtor’s nonpriority unsecured debt, as
long as that amount is at least $6,575. The
debtor may rebut a presumption of abuse
only by a showing of special circumstances
that justify additional expenses or adjustments of current monthly income.
motion to lift the automatic stay: A
request by a creditor to allow the creditor
to take action against the debtor or the
debtor’s property that would otherwise be
prohibited by the automatic stay.
party in interest: A party who has
standing to be heard by the court in a matter to be decided in the bankruptcy case.
The debtor, the U.S. trustee or bankruptcy
administrator, the case trustee and creditors are parties in interest for most matters.
petition preparer: A business not
authorized to practice law that prepares
bankruptcy petitions.
plan: A debtor’s detailed description of
how the debtor proposes to pay creditors’
claims over a fixed period of time.
plaintiff: A person or business that files
a formal complaint with the court.
postpetition transfer: A transfer of
the debtor’s property made after the commencement of the case.
prebankruptcy planning: The arrangement (or rearrangement) of a debtor’s property to allow the debtor to take
maximum advantage of exemptions. (Prebankruptcy planning typically includes
converting nonexempt assets into exempt
assets.)
preference or preferential debt payment: A debt payment made to a creditor
in the 90-day period before a debtor files
bankruptcy (or within one year if the creditor was an insider) that gives the creditor
more than the creditor would receive in
the debtor’s chapter 7 case.
presumption of abuse: See means test.
priority: The Bankruptcy Code’s statutory ranking of unsecured claims that determines the order in which unsecured
claims will be paid if there is not enough
money to pay all unsecured claims in
full. For example, under the Bankruptcy
Code’s priority scheme, money owed to
the case trustee or for prepetition alimony
and/or child support must be paid in full
before any general unsecured debt (i.e.
trade debt or credit card debt) is paid.
priority claim: An unsecured claim
that is entitled to be paid ahead of other
unsecured claims that are not entitled to
priority status. Priority refers to the order
in which these unsecured claims are to be
paid.
proof of claim: A written statement
and verifying documentation filed by a
creditor that describes the reason the
debtor owes the creditor money. (There is
an official form for this purpose.)
no-asset case: A chapter 7 case where
there are no assets available to satisfy any
portion of the creditors’ unsecured claims.
nondischargeable debt: A debt that
cannot be eliminated in bankruptcy. Examples include a home mortgage, debts
for alimony or child support, certain taxes, debts for most government funded or
guaranteed educational loans or benefit
overpayments, debts arising from death or
personal injury caused by driving while intoxicated or under the influence of drugs,
and debts for restitution or a criminal fine
included in a sentence on the debtor’s
conviction of a crime. Some debts, such
as debts for money or property obtained
by false pretenses and debts for fraud or
defalcation while acting in a fiduciary capacity may be declared nondischargeable
only if a creditor timely files and prevails
in a nondischargeability action.
objection to dischargeability: A trustee’s or creditor’s objection to the debtor
being released from personal liability for
certain dischargeable debts. Common reasons include allegations that the debt to
be discharged was incurred by false pretenses or that debt arose because of the
debtor’s fraud while acting as a fiduciary.
objection to exemptions: A trustee’s
or creditor’s objection to the debtor’s attempt to claim certain property as exempt
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property of the estate: All legal or equitable interests of the debtor in property
as of the commencement of the case.
reaffirmation agreement: An agreement by a chapter 7 debtor to continue
paying a dischargeable debt (such as an
auto loan) after the bankruptcy, usually
for the purpose of keeping collateral (i.e.
the car) that would otherwise be subject
to repossession.
schedules: Detailed lists filed by the
debtor along with (or shortly after filing)
the petition showing the debtor’s assets,
liabilities, and other financial information.
(There are official forms a debtor must
use.)
secured creditor: A creditor holding a
claim against the debtor who has the right
to take and hold or sell certain property of
the debtor in satisfaction of some or all of
the claim.
secured debt: Debt backed by a mortgage, pledge of collateral, or other lien;
debt for which the creditor has the right to
pursue specific pledged property upon default. Examples include home mortgages,
auto loans and tax liens.
small business case: A special type of
chapter 11 case in which there is no creditors’ committee (or the creditors’ committee is deemed inactive by the court) and
in which the debtor is subject to more
oversight by the U.S. trustee than other
chapter 11 debtors. The Bankruptcy Code
contains certain provisions designed to reduce the time a small business debtor is in
bankruptcy.
statement of financial affairs: A series of questions the debtor must answer
in writing concerning sources of income,
transfers of property, lawsuits by creditors,
etc. (There is an official form a debtor
must use.)
statement of intention: A declaration
made by a chapter 7 debtor concerning
plans for dealing with consumer debts that
are secured by property of the estate.
substantive consolidation: Putting
the assets and liabilities of two or more
related debtors into a single pool to pay
creditors. (Courts are reluctant to allow
substantive consolidation since the action
must not only justify the benefit that one
set of creditors receives, but also the harm
that other creditors suffer as a result.)
341 meeting: The meeting of creditors
required by section 341 of the Bankruptcy
CERTIFICATIONS
Code at which the debtor is questioned
under oath by creditors, a trustee, examiner, or the U.S. trustee about his/her financial affairs. Also called creditors’ meeting.
transfer: Any mode or means by which
a debtor disposes of or parts with his/her
property.
trustee: The representative of the
bankruptcy estate who exercises statutory
powers, principally for the benefit of the
unsecured creditors, under the general
supervision of the court and the direct
supervision of the U.S. trustee or bankruptcy administrator. The trustee is a private individual or corporation appointed
in all chapter 7, chapter 12, and chapter
13 cases and some chapter 11 cases. The
trustee’s responsibilities include reviewing
the debtor’s petition and schedules and
bringing actions against creditors or the
debtor to recover property of the bankruptcy estate. In chapter 7, the trustee
liquidates property of the estate, and
makes distributions to creditors. Trustees
in chapter 12 and 13 have similar duties
to a chapter 7 trustee and the additional
responsibilities of overseeing the debtor’s
plan, receiving payments from debtors,
and disbursing plan payments to creditors.
U.S. trustee: An officer of the Justice
Department responsible for supervising
the administration of bankruptcy cases,
estates, and trustees; monitoring plans
and disclosure statements; monitoring
creditors’ committees; monitoring fee applications; and performing other statutory
duties. Compare with bankruptcy administrator.
undersecured claim: A debt secured
by property that is worth less than the full
amount of the debt.
unliquidated claim: A claim for which
a specific value has not been determined.
unscheduled debt: A debt that should
have been listed by the debtor in the
schedules filed with the court but was
not. (Depending on the circumstances,
an unscheduled debt may or may not be
discharged.)
unsecured claim: A claim or debt for
which a creditor holds no special assurance of payment, such as a mortgage or
lien; a debt for which credit was extended
based solely upon the creditor’s assessment of the debtor’s future ability to pay.
voluntary transfer: A transfer of a
debtor’s property with the debtor’s consent.
This glossary was found on the Web site of the
U.S. Courts at http://www.uscourts.gov/bankruptcycourts/bankruptcybasics/glossary.html.
Newly Certified
Congratulations to the individuals who
passed the May and July 2009 exams.
Registered Diplomate Reporters (RDR)
Molly Ann Bowers, Hurst, TX
Susan Argo Heierman, Shelby Township,
MI
Gail L. Inghram, Boothwyn, PA
Sabrina King, Baton Rouge, LA
Verne Mullins, Metairie, LA
Janice McMoran, Granbury, TX
Doreen Perkins, Fresno, CA
Registered Merit Reporters
(RMR)
Marguerite Anderson, Waterford, MI
Rebecca Banks, Virginia Beach, VA
Rhonda K. Hall-Breuwet, Brandon, FL
Kellee Cortez, Cedar Rapids, IA
Sally Beth Cekander, Zionsville, IN
Cynthia Depweg, Poway, CA
Shawna Janese Evans, Hilliard, OH
Stephanie Jill Early, Sioux City, IA
Heather Hall, Harlingen, TX
Tana J. Hess, Marquette Heights, IL
Tamara Hoffschildt, Thornton, CO
Denae Hovland, Prescott Valley, AZ
Elizabeth A. Howd, Cross Lanes, WV
Denise Ryan King Paddock, San
Clemente, CA
Helana E. Kline, Middleboro, MA
Suzanne M. McKennon, Fresno, CA
Bridget Montero, Los Angeles, CA
Verne Bohdan Mullins, Metairie, LA
Kelly Polvi, Salem, OR
Jeffrey Weigl, Edmonton, Alberta
Kati McVeay Vogt, Biloxi, MS
Registered Professional Reporters (RPR)
Jaclyn Adami, Dunellen, NJ
Erin Elizabeth Alexander, Kutztown, PA
Marsha Allmaras, East Grand Forks, MN
Mary G. Allred, Calgary, AB
Gloria Ann Anzalone, Fort Lauderdale, FL
Rich Alossi, Los Angeles, CA
Tami Lewis, Canton, TX
Candice Andino, Huntington Beach, CA
Velma A. Arellano, Corpus Christi, TX
Mark Arndt, Belleville, IL
Denise D. Bach, Haddonfield, NJ
Kristie G. Bailey, Birmingham, AL
Lori M. Barnes, Lewis Center, OH
Lori A. Beard, Phoenix, AZ
James Beasley, San Francisco, CA
Delcine M. Benavides, San Antonio, TX
Elayne Bentley, Riverside, CA
Holly M. Bergeron, Port Allen, LA
C. Jeanine Black, Pensacola, FL
Jane A. Bramblett, San Diego, CA
Dana Borre, Altoona, PA
Mary C. Bouchard, Coral Springs, FL
Brandy Lynn Bradley, Carmel, IN
Lisa T. Brantly, Cumming, GA
Richetta R. Bright, Jacksonville, FL
Renee M. Bunde, Galt, CA
Carolyn Marie Burke, Columbus, OH
Tammi Sue Burnham, Warwick, RI
Sara Cahill, Fayetteville, NC
Amy Campobello, Williamsville, NY
Angela Carithers, Bossier City, LA
Angela Kathryn Carl, Minneapolis, MN
Kevin Patrick Carlin, Buffalo, NY
LeShaunda Cass-Byrd, Charlotte, NC
Kelly Ann Catanzariti, Philadelphia, PA
Nancy Christensen, Eagle, ID
Summer A. Clanton, Santa Clara, CA
Patricia L. Clausen, Sacramento, CA
Hayley Phyllis Clifford, North Hills, CA
Kate Cochran, Snellville, GA
Beverley Theresa Cole, Kingston,
Rebecca J. Collings, Castle Rock, CO
Sheri Game Connelly, Alabaster, AL
Teresa L. Cooper, Sharpsburg, GA
Elizabeth Lorraine Cordoba, Miramar, FL
Dannielle Kae Cox, Thiensville, WI
Natalie Dahl, Summerville, SC
Stephanie R. Dean, Doylestown, OH
Terry L. Dedrick, Kelseyville, CA
Ann Delgado, Temecula, CA
Maria D. Dempsey, Charleston, SC
Lindsay Nicole DeWaide, Poynette, WI
Angela Marie DiNino, Lansing, IL
Lisa A. Domino, Old Bridge, NJ
Julie Lynne DuCoin, Brighton, MI
Charo Dunlap, Ardmore, OK
Stefanie Herrera Eastman, Ripon, CA
Christine Eddy, San Diego, CA
Marissa M. Elliott, Webster, TX
Christy Jelene Fagan, Mansfield, TX
Amie M. Farbak, Homer Glen, IL
Josephine H. Fassett, Dayton, NJ
Tanner Joy Feast, Plano, TX
Gail S. Finn, Philadelphia, PA
Sheila K. Finnegan, Madison, WI
Jane Anne Fitch, West Chester, OH
Julia Star Foreman, Bakersfield, CA
Janice Marie Foster, Visalia, CA
Kimberly Fowler, Bethany, OK
Liebe Frnges, Allentown, PA
Amanda B. Frank, Greenville, TX
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CERTIFICATIONS
Clay James Frazier, Murrieta, CA
Regina E. Geissinger, Indianapolis, IN
Kim Gibney, Whitehall, PA
Debbie Glennon, Lakewood, CO
Lisa Ann Grambo, Grosse Pointe Woods,
MI
Ruth M. Grant, Sebastopol, CA
Sally L. Gray, Macon, GA
Deborah Ann Grebin, Preston, MN
Jamie Halpin, Cumberland, RI
Terri Hamilton, Arlington, VA
Katie A. Harmon, South Jordan, UT
Debbie A. Harnen, Waukesha, WI
Tracy Herron-Rice, Martinsburg, WV
Gary W. Hill, Scottsdale, AZ
Andrea Marie Hodapp, Harrison, OH
Renee A. Hoffman, Charlottesville, VA
Brenna Renee Homfeld, Houston, TX
Jane Louise Horne, Hillsboro, OH
Michelle Houston, Philadelphia, PA
Anne Jacobs, Madison, WI
Laura Elise Jankowski, Berkeley Heights,
NJ
Lisa Marie Jasmin, Shelby Township, MI
Michael Brandon Jenkins, Franklin, TN
Katherine M. Johnson, Springfield, MO
Leslie Robin Johnson, Carlsbad, CA
Mallory M. Johnson, Montgomery, AL
Maura Johnson, Dumfries, VA
Paula J. Johnson, Springfield, MO
Sharonda Jones, Bronx, NY
Monique Kaiser, North Prairie, WI
Kelly A. Karnafel, Anaheim, CA
Carrie A. Kaufman, Fory Fort, PA
Elizabeth V. Kedrick, Honesdale, PA
Erin R. Keniston, Syracuse, NY
Karen L. Kessler, Scottsdale, AZ
Laura Lynne Kiel, Hesperia, CA
Jieun Ashley Kim, Santa Cruz, CA
Sandra Dee Kin, Powell, OH
Pamela L. Kingsbury, Paml Harbor, FL
Christine Marie Knox, Oregon, WI
Linda Kennard, West Linn, OR
Nancy M. Kottenstette, Indianapolis, IN
Jean Lazaar, Bedminster, NJ
Jerrold Lefler, Palm Harbor, FL
Maria Janine Lertora, Daly City, CA
Kim Lewin, Yukon, OK
Tami Lewis, Canton, TX
Monica A. Lindstrom, Fort Worth, TX
Rachel M. Lopez, Arlington, VA
Katie Loupe, Houma, LA
Michelle R. Lowe, York, PA
Leslie Lucas, Lemont, IL
Michele Lucchese, Colts Neck, NJ
Lisa Lyon, Tinley Park, IL
Julie Ann Macera, Derby, KS
Debra Ann Minton, Jenks, OK
Cheryl MacMillan, Spartanburg, SC
24
Caroline Jane Maddox, Alexandria, VA
Heather Ann Malmquist-Schuetz,
Anoka, MN
Connie M. Martin Dunne, Concord, CA
Alison C. Matthes, Rochester Hills, MI
Lynn McCloskey, Williamstown, NJ
Aline R McDougall, DeWinton, AB
Brynna K. McGee, Lewisville, TX
Theresa E. McKibbin, Patchogue, NY
Jennifer L. McLeod, Federal Way, WA
Laura K. McMahon, Colorado Springs, CO
Christine Means, Aurora, CO
Stefanie Mensch, Cooper City, FL
Timothy Miller, Brick, NJ
Debra Ann Minton, Jenks, OK
Gregory Steven Mizanin, North
Royalton, OH
Shayna Raelene Montgomery, Valencia, CA
Genevie Morell, Cleveland, OH
Kelly A. Morgan, Bayonne, NJ
Christine E. Morrow, Pensacola, FL
Joel Moyer, Cincinnati, OH
Shanon R. Myers, Albuquerque, NM
Darah Leigh Nekola, Charleston, SC
Patricia A. Niemiec, Denville, NJ
Dawn K. Oaks, Prescott, AZ
Terri L. Ochipinti, Mount Holly, NJ
Erik Matthew Paul Olson, Portland, OR
Karen C. Orenstein, Gurnee, IL
Ivette Maria Oviedo, Miami, FL
Robert W. Paschal, Albuquerque, NM
Amy Pedersen, Des Moines, IA
Tracy Lynn Perry, Lafayette, CA
Deann Marie Peterson, Ham Lake, MN
Jill L. Pettengill, San Jose, CA
Jannette, Price, Atlanta GA
Jolanda L. Price, Fayetteville, GA
Janelle Kay Prusi, Winona, MN
Beth Radabaugh, Flanders, NJ
Debra Read, Alta Loma, CA
Mary Jeana Reiner, Nampa, ID
Tanzi Reule, Big Valley, AB
Debra Rice, Manahawkin, NJ
Andrea Martha Rinker, Anaheim, CA
Robin Rios, Manuel, TX
Christine Julie Roybal, Albuquerque, NM
Jamie R. Sanchez, Roswell, NM
Alicia Santana, Yuma, AZ
Johannah Schewe, Springfield, MO
Christina Schmitz, Troy, MI
Lynn Schultz, De Forest, WI
George N. Schumer, Richmond, CA
Christina Marie Schwandt, Grover
Beach, CA
Cindy R. Segars, Florence, AL
Anita T. Shemin, Scarsdale, NY
Christine E. Shepard, Salem, OR
Stacy L. Sheppard, Lexington, SC
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Diane M. Bennett-Siecinski, Brighton, MI
Lisa G. Simescu, Delray Beach, FL
Tara Suzanne Sims, Billoxi, MS
Mari Bruno Skalicky, Excelsior, MN
Kate Anne Slayden, Martinsburg, WV
Cheryl Sletta, Santa Ana, CA
Kathleen M. Smith, Troy, MI
Tonya Roshell Smith, McKinney, TX
Maria D. Solares, Coral Gables, FL
Antoinette M. Starace Garza, Royal Palm
Beach, FL
Elissa Ashley Steen, Westminster, CO
Stacey Dee Stephens, Portland, OR
Tanya Darlene Stepp, St. Charles, MO
Nanetta Lashelle Stigler, Merrillville, IN
Melanie Stinson-Konstantinidis, Miami,
FL
Joyce G. Stockman, Kent, WA
Ashley N. Stokes, Gary, IN
Kasi Strain, Longview, TX
Kelly A. Surina, Lafayette, LA
Kathleen A. Swenor, Manahawkin, NJ
Kimberley Anne Sziva, Edmonton, AB
Shelly Beth Taylor, Lubbock, TX
Patricia K. Thomas, Acworth, GA
Sophia Thomas-Blissett, Cape Coral, FL
Elizabeth M. Tiedemann, Santa Rosa
Beach, FL
Kimberly V. Tietze, Vacaville, CA
Carol A. Timmins, Everson, WA
Deborah J. Torbert, Oklahoma City, OK
Jill Hudnall Trail, Chesapeake, VA
Denise L. Travis, Camp Hill, PA
Catherine L. Turner, O’Fallon, IL
Chiara Ulvi, Southampton, PA
June Vandenberg, West Bend, WI
Mariann Vianello, The Hague,
Rolayne M. Volpe, San Juan, PR
Jodi M. Wagner, Aurora, CO
Merilee Sue Wait, Minneapolis, MN
Angela Waters, Cherry Hill, NJ
Heather Watson, Carmichael, CA
Mattie Welch-McIntyre, Elk Grove, CA
Kimberley A. Werth, Hanford, CA
Tiffany Joy Wesley, Philadelphia, PA
Tia M. Whaley, Roanoke, AL
Jamie L. Wiese, Philadelphia, PA
Allison H. Wilcox, Marietta, GA
Heidi M. Winfield, DeBary, FL
Erin Worley, Gridley, CA
Janet L. Wynne, Acton, MA
Deidre P. Young, Glendora, CA
Justine Yurchak, Bloomsburg, PA
Susan Zielie, Kenosha, WI
Roxann Nadine Zuniga, Columbia, MO
CERTIFICATIONS
Certified Realtime Reporters
(CRR)
Geanell Chatman Adams, Greenville, MS
Adriana A. Araneta, Mission Viejo, CA
Amanda M. Bair, Cedar Falls, IA
Ann W. Baldassari, Orlando, FL
Carla R. Bebault, St. Paul, MN
Bonnie J. Buckley, Albany, NY
Denise C. Budde, Lisbon, IA
Rebecca J. Callow, Austin, TX
Molly S. Carter, Corpus Christi, TX
Robyn E. Chalk, Santa Rosa, CA
Lynda L. Clark, Oak Ridge, TN
Samantha Erin Cohen, Memphis, TN
Valerie Jones Conn, Cincinnati, OH
Cheryl Dahlstrom, Boston, MA
Sabrina Ann D’Emidio, Bronx, NY
Lenny J. Di Paolo, Kenai, AK
Francesca DiBella, Howell, NJ
Stacy Lynn Drohosky, Crown Point, IN
Greta H. Duckett, Montgomery, AL
Vicki L. Eastvold, Duluth, MN
Christine Elminowski, Monroe, NC
Calvin J. Everson, Eveleth, MN
Karen Jo Fortna, Birmingham, MI
Robin Lee Fouraker, Chattanooga, TN
Kimberly A. Fralick, Sacramento, CA
Robert L. French, Denton, TX
Anthony D. Frisolone, Staten Island, NY
Kimberly Hiromi Girgus, Seattle, WA
Lynn A. Gordon, Waterloo, IA
Pamela A. Griffin, Phoenix, AZ
Victoria Anastasia Guerrero, Norco, CA
Tamara I. Hohenleitner, Boise, ID
Parian T. Holderfield, Decatur, AL
Ann Marie Hollo, Litchfield, IL
Carmen J. Howard, Plymouth, MN
Chris Villano Iba, Portland, OR
Gail L. Inghram, Boothwyn, PA
Kendra E. Johnston, Williamsport, OH
Lisa B. Kelly, Lakewood, CO
Catalina Kerr, Washington, DC
Laura LaCien, Chicago, IL
Rebecca Lucas, Colorado Springs, CO
Brenda MacKay, West Jordan, UT
Michelle Malay, Lubbock, TX
Connie J. McAlister, Farmersville, CA
Sheralyn R. McCormick, Everett, WA
Kathleen McHugh, Audubon, NJ
Jill M. McLaughlin, Eau Claire, WI
Rose M. Miller, Hayward, CA
Mary W. Miller, Issaquah, WA
Tammy Moon, Carmichael, CA
Susanne E. Moon, Versailles, MO
Beverlee DeMode Nagata, Garden
Grove, CA
Lisa Nihan-Demeule, Merrimac, MA
Ayako Odanaka, Somerville, MA
Amber M. Owen, Tamarac, FL
Nancy E. Paulsen, Englewood, FL
Sharolyn J. Pavlovich, Livonia, MI
Nayann Bishilany Pazyniak, Chesterland,
OH
James Clyde Pence, Imperial Beach, CA
Lindsey R. Perry, Lincoln, CA
Robert Portas, Staten Island, NY
Judith Ann Romano, Philadelphia, PA
Dana Jo Rowe, Lovington, IL
Kim Rupiper, Phoenix, AZ
Christin E. Russell, Rochester Hills, MI
Cassandra Savage, Independence, MO
Wendy M. Scott, La Palma, CA
Robin A. Seligman, Huntington Beach,
CA
Stephanie J. Smithson, Richland, WA
Debra C. Symonds, Portland, OR
Ronald Elliot Tolkin, Brooklyn, NY
Silvia P. Wage, Freehold, NJ
Krista L. Wagner, Dallas, TX
Marlene Lewis, Wakeman, OH
Sherree Franich Wilson, Hayward, CA
Megan Elizabeth Zalmai, San Ramon, CA
Amy L. Zoller, Rapid City, SD
Certified Broadcast CaptionerS (CBC)
Teresa DeCiancio, Middleburg, FL
Abbi K. Forshier, Grimes, IA
Melissa Marie Geetings, Pella, IA
Henny Hunter Gerard, Towson, MD
Lisa Nihan-Demeule, Merrimac, MA
Robin A. Seligman, Huntington Beach,
CA
Certified CART Providers (CCP)
Kimberly Hiromi Girgus, Seattle, WA
Mirabai K. Knight, New York, NY
Alena Koumarianos, Lathrop, CA
Debbie L. Whitney, Vacaville, CA
John Wissenbach, San Francisco, CA
Henny H. Gerard, Towson, MD
Janell Gruber, Sauk Rapids, MN
Mary Boom, Little Falls, MN
Mary W. Miller, Issaquah, WA
CERTIFIED MANAGERS OF REPORTING SERVICES (CMRS)
Stacey Lombardo, RMR, CRR, Everett,
WA
Lisa Boyd, RPR, Fort Myers, FL
Rita Pratt, Indianapolis, IN
Lori Heaphy, CCR, RPR, Lafayette,
LA
Mari Temple, RPR, Alva, FL
Norma Wegerle, CSR, RMR, Wichita,
KS
Maia Colucci, Victor, NY
Earl Hicks Jr., Glenwood, MD
NCRA 2010
FOR
Annual Convention & Exposition
August 5–8, 2010 Chicago, IL
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
25
REPORTING
S T U D E N T
R E P O R T I N G
The Two Most Important
Lessons
I have overcome fears and weaknesses that have
held me back for a very long time — fears that I
did not realize were affecting multiple areas of my
By Molly Sasajima
life. I feel I have mastered valuable life skills that
hen I first began to study court reporting 18 months
ago, I had no inkling of what an enormous commitment it would require from me. I quickly learned,
however, that in order to be successful, I would need
to devote copious amounts of time and energy to attending classes and fitting in hours of practice time. As a returning
student with a full-time job and full-time class schedule, I found
the task daunting to say the least. I soon discovered that court
reporting school would force me to master two major principles:
discipline and self-confidence. These are the most important lessons my studies have taught me.
Discipline is one of the most fundamental — if not the most
imperative — skills a court reporting student can have. One simply cannot keep up with the cumulative nature of the coursework
without daily practice. Thinking about this, I remembered reading
about delayed gratification years ago as a technique for managing
difficult tasks. But I never applied it consistently to my life, or at
least not long enough to see any lasting results. Delayed gratification can be defined as “the process of scheduling the pain and
pleasure of life in such as way as to enhance the pleasure by meeting and experiencing the pain first and getting it over with” (Peck
1978). I had to make sure that I scheduled enough practice before
recreation time by getting up early on weekends, working through
lunchtime at work, and giving up social engagements. I am now
seeing the long-term benefits of this principle. I have not only
maintained a 4.0 grade point average, but I have also advanced
more quickly through my coursework, advancing to 140 words per
minute a full semester early.
In my work and personal life, discipline has been its own reward. I have applied the concept of delayed gratification at work. I
now tackle the difficult tasks first instead of dreading them all day.
As a result, my productivity and enjoyment of work are far greater
than before. Discipline and delayed gratification have proved even
more valuable in my personal life. Lack of follow-through has been
a stubborn pattern with which I have continuously struggled. A
project would look fun and exciting, but if it demanded too much
of me, I would quit just as quickly as I began. Up until recently, my
life could be seen as a series of abandoned initiatives: from stopping ballet in the first grade, to quitting marching band in high
school, to canceling attempts to finish college. Court reporting
has given me a rewarding goal that is worth seeing through to the
end. I know that, beyond school, I will be more selective in my
projects and will have attained the necessary skills and experience
to complete them.
Self-confidence has been a far more difficult lesson for me to
master than discipline. Discipline became a good habit within
weeks of starting court reporting school. Confidence is something
I am only just starting to grasp a year and a half later. Ever since
will help me in the court reporting profession and
W
26
in my personal life.
elementary school, I have battled with low self-esteem and performance anxiety — particularly when it came to tests. Court reporting school forced me to deal with these issues, as tests are given
daily in speedbuilding classes. I came to realize over time that
practice alone is not enough preparation for tests; I have to prepare myself mentally as well. Candis Bradshaw advises on NCRA’s
Online Forum that she spends the majority of the time getting in
the correct frame of mind: “If you don’t have the speed and accuracy when you’re driving to the test, you’re not going to get it
before the test.” This realization was truly liberating for me. The
space in my brain that was once dominated by fear of the dreaded
outcome is now relaxed and calmly focused on the present moment only. Not only is test-taking easier, but I have also reached
a level of acceptance that has made my daily life far less stressful.
Overcoming a simple fear like test-taking has had a far-reaching ripple effect that I did not anticipate. Outside of the classroom,
I have been able to manage nervousness in difficult situations with
greater ease and poise. Rather than wish problems would go away
of their own accord, I am more likely to acknowledge them and
find solutions quickly, before they become unmanageable. I also
find myself more willing to deal with conflict, whether it is with
another person or within myself, because I know I am capable of
not only facing fears, but also dealing with them effectively and
maturely.
The invaluable lessons of discipline and self-confidence I have
learned from court reporting school have improved my life in the
most helpful and unexpected ways. I have overcome fears and
weaknesses that have held me back for a very long time — fears
that I did not realize were affecting multiple areas of my life. I feel
I have mastered valuable life skills that will help me in the court
reporting profession and in my personal life. Luckily, this also happens to be the field of study that I thoroughly enjoy. I look forward
to all of the challenges and rewards that come with it.
Molly Sasajima is a student at MacCormac College in Chicago, Ill. She won
the third-place CASE Student Scholarship of $500 for this essay.
references
JCR, “Nervousness and Test-Taking,” September 2008.
Peck, M. Scott, The Road Less Traveled (New York: Simon
& Schuster, Inc., 1978).
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REPORTING
H O W
T H E Y
S H A L L
H E A R ?
Reaching the
Masses
By Pat Gardiner and Julie Poenitsch
I
first met Julie Poenitsch, RDR, CRR,
in Appleton, Wis., in April of 2009,
and was very excited to hear that she
provided CART for her church, St.
Clare Parish, in Wind Lake, about
25 miles southeast of Milwaukee. “Please
share your story with us,” I invited, and
Julie agreed.
She has been a court reporter for 26
years. She graduated in April 1983; received her Merit in 1991, CRR in 1994,
and RDR in 2007; and has been a freelance reporter her entire career. She has
worked for the past 22 years for Gramann
Reporting, Ltd., in Milwaukee.
Over the years, she has provided
realtime for many depositions and trials
where realtime services were needed,
has provided CART in the classroom for
some college students in recent years, and
has had many great opportunities in her
court reporting career, including three
weeks of realtime depositions in Japan
in 2004, and this past summer going to
England for two depositions. This is a lady
who steps out of the box and enjoys the
challenges of an adventure! So, why not
in a church? It took great determination
and perseverance, but Julie did not give
up. Here’s her story.
hidden talents
I had brought up the idea of providing CART services for my parish approximately three years before it finally came to
fruition. I had told my pastor, Father John
Hemsing, about the technology available
to provide realtime text during mass so
that people who were having a hard time
hearing the mass could still participate
and be a part of the mass. I suggested having a large screen with a projector. He was
reluctant, as he did not want CART to be
a distraction to the other parishioners.
Then our parish was building a new
church, which was dedicated in April of
2005. During the planning process, they
had asked for parishioners’ input regarding what to include in the new church. I
had mentioned perhaps having a closedloop system for the hard of hearing or a
location set aside for a CART provider. I,
once again, explained that I was willing to
provide CART services. Due to finances,
the closed-loop system was not put in, and
Father John was still reluctant about the
suggestion for CART services.
I also am a lector at my church, and
with the new church’s sound system, our
group was receiving complaints that people were having a hard time hearing the
readings. Father John was also receiving
complaints about it. They were trying to
address the issues with the new sound system and I, again, brought up that many of
the older people of the parish could benefit from my providing CART services.
Well, Father John did come to understand, and his comments are helpful to us
all. He explained, “We have a great sound
system in our new church, but the reality
of life is that some people naturally lose
their hearing, some lose it due to military
service, and some due to working in a loud
atmosphere. The best sound system in the
world can’t help them.”
Father John asked if it was possible
to have a few large computer monitors
instead of a large screen and projector. I
checked into it and found that I could get
a video splitter, which would put whatever was showing on my computer up on
the individual computer monitors. The
church purchased the three 19-inch computer monitors, a video splitter for up to 8
connections, the needed cables, and three
small tables to mount the monitors to.
The monitors are mounted above
the pews near the choir area. They are
placed near the musicians so that hearingimpaired members can sing along to the
music while feeling the vibration of the
songs and hymns beneath their feet. I sit
near the monitors. The monitors are set
up permanently near the choir area, and
I provide my writer, computer, and Eclipse
software.
I began by sitting in the back of the
church with my own equipment for about
a month so that I could add new words to
my dictionary. There were many dictionary entries to make, as many of the words
used in church are never used in our legal
work. There was a member of our parish
in her forties who had been losing her
hearing over the years and was so excited
about this program starting up. She sat
with me in the back for a couple of weeks
The view from the pew: Church-goers
with hearing impairments gain access with
monitors and a realtime feed by Julie Poenitsch, RDR, CRR.
to offer any suggestions regarding font and
readability.
Finally, in December 2006, I provided
CART for my first mass at St. Clare Parish.
We have a congregation of 800 families,
about 2200 members. Father John had announced in church at both masses what
I was doing so that people would know
about the new program. The information was also placed in our bulletin. The
congregation was informed that I would
generally provide CART services on the
first and third Sunday of the month and
second and fourth Saturday, but they were
also told that the bulletin would have the
little “CC” symbol (for closed captioning)
next to the mass for the following weekend that I would be providing CART for.
The church also had two beautiful
wooden signs made. If it is a mass I am
providing services for, one is placed out in
the narthex area stating that CART will
be provided at this mass near the choir
area. The second sign is placed at the section of pews where CART is provided. I
do cut back on my CART schedule during
the summer to provide for more flexibility
for myself.
I think an average of four to five people
at each mass regularly benefit from the
CART. Some regularly tell me “thank you”
or “God bless you” during either the sign
of peace or after mass.
Because I am a lector at my church, I
already have the lector’s workbook with
all the readings and Gospels for the year.
I look over the readings ahead of time and
adds any new words that may not be in my
dictionary. By e-mail, the parish secretary
sends me the announcements and prayers
of the faithful each week. In turn, I e-mail
to the secretary my schedule so she can insert the “CC” symbol in the bulletin.
I never know what the pastor will talk
about in his homily. That’s where I occa-
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27
REPORTING
sionally have to finger spell a name mentioned or improvise in wording. Early on,
during one of the homilies, the pastor was
repeatedly talking about the “Nazarenes.”
which did not translate correctly, so I had
to instead write ‘Nazareth people.’
One Sunday morning I had one of
our parishioners bring her mother-inlaw, who was visiting from Florida, to the
CART area. The woman was ecstatic! She
hadn’t really heard the mass for a number
of years and was so excited. She said she
came from a rather well-to-do parish and
was going home to talk to her pastor about
providing CART.
The next week, our parishioner called
me and asked if I could send her some
information that she could send to her
mother-in-law because the pastor in
Florida had no idea what she was talking
about. The parishioner also told me that
her mother-in-law couldn’t stop talking
about the CART and how wonderful it
was to participate in the mass. That made
me feel really good!
The parishioner’s mother-in-law is doing all she can to get her own parish to
provide this CART ministry. It really does
make a difference in people’s lives! Hearing this in the e-mail I received makes
it all so worthwhile.
Now that I’ve been providing CART
for almost three years, it is still very rewarding. Court reporting has been a won-
derful career for me, and it’s great to use
my skills to give something back to others.
I feel as court reporters, we have a special gift, and I am able to use that gift to
help others read the Gospel as it is being
proclaimed and the homily as it is being
preached.
I hope I inspire some of you to look into
providing CART for your church. One bit
of advice I can give is not to give up the
first time you mention it. Sometimes it
takes a few times to convince others that
this is a great service to provide.
Making a Difference
An article was written about Julie in
the Catholic Herald back on October 4,
2007. The article began, “Imagine attending Mass in a soundproof room with only a
window through which to view the priest,
lectors, and choir. The Mass would be a
visual experience rather than a participatory action; watching the priest preach his
homily would be aggravating and frustrating.” Well, Julie has changed all of that
and is truly making a difference in her
parish.
JCR Contributing Editor Pat Gardiner is
from Milton, Ontario, Canada. For more
information on providing CART/captioning
in a place of worship, please go to www.
captioningtheword.com.
church briefs
Here are some helpful dictionary entries
provided by Julie:
bishop
– BEUP
archbishop – A*B
archdiocese – A*D
Arimathea – AEURPL/
THAOE/A
alleluia – LAOU/KWRA
heaven – HEFPB
Lenten – HREPBT/PB
Pentecost – PEPBT/KO*S
Epiphany – PEUF/TPHEU
Pontius Pilate – P*P
Apostle – POS/L
Pilate – PAOEULT
Mary Magdalene – M*M
begotten – B-GT
Bethlehem – PW*PL or
PWE*PL or
PW-PL
Jerusalem
– SKWR*PL or
SKWRE*PL or
SKRW-PL
28
Beatitudes –
Barabbas
–
Capernaum –
Corinthians –
Colossians
–
ecclesial –
thy
–
throne –
Nazarene –
disciple –
Galatian –
Galilean –
Samaria
–
Virgin Mary
–
Jesus Christ
–
Judas Iscariot
–
PWAT/TAOUDZ
PWRAB/US
KPERPB/UPL
KREUPBT/
KWRAPBS
KHRORB/APBS
KHRAOES/
KWRAL
THAOEU (use
THAO*EU for
thigh)
THRO*EPB
TPHAZ/RAOEPB
TKEU/SAOEUPL
TKPWHRAEUGS
TKPWAL/
HRAOEPB
SPHAEUR/
KWRA
SR*PL or SR-PL
SKWR-BG
SKWR*EU
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B E Y O N D
T H E
C O M F O R T
Z O N E
A Number of
Firsts
By Monette Benoit
T
he October e-mail from Karen
Sadler began:
Hi, Monette.
I hope you remember me. A few years
ago I asked you about court reporters being used
for Deaf people in educational environments.
I want to let you know that I finished my work
and graduated with a Ph.D. in science education.
I thought you might be interested in my research.
The 2003 to 2009 study related the work of court
reporters compared to interpreters (court reporters did so much better than interpreters). It’s been
a long haul for me, with a lot of obstacles.
I’m teaching sciences at two universities right
now, both online and classroom.
Your name is in my (doctoral) references, and
you helped significantly with understanding what
court reporters do. Basically, they did a phenomenal job, and the only mistakes were due to science words not recognized by the dictionary in the
software. … You taught me things I didn’t know
about court reporters. I also asked you about software programs that court reporters use.
Karen and I, in real-time, stepped back
into our e-mail friendship. As we wrote,
she was teaching multiple science courses,
reviewing homework, and then grading final exams. I asked Karen Sadler to share
her personal story.
Court reporters and CART providers currently sharing — and desiring to
provide — equal access accommodations
with deaf and hard of hearing individuals
in an academic setting or work environment or social gathering (yes, in all settings) have much to learn from Dr. Karen
Sadler. I am honored to introduce you to
Karen L. Sadler, Ph.D.
passing the test
I was born in Salt Lake City severely
hard of hearing, in 1956. But my parents
did not ‘discover’ it until I was 3 years old,
when my mom noticed I was not turning
around when she rang a bell behind me.
So that started all the testing and speech
therapy, and what not that all HOH, hard
of hearing, and Deaf children go through.
I am legally deaf. I have no hearing in
my right ear, and have an over 90-110 db
(decibel) loss in my left ear, in most tones,
REPORTING
but especially tones that encompass the
human voice.
I grew up in the San Francisco Bay
Area in California where I went to a public school because there were no schools
for the Deaf close enough that my mother
felt comfortable sending me to. I had a
great family with two sisters. They were all
musical, so I grew up with the piano constantly playing. I learned to understand
music and play several instruments myself.
The schools were never comfortable
having a deaf student in their classes, so I
was constantly pulled out of class to take
IQ tests. They thought they could test me
out of the system and put me into a school
for the mentally retarded. This happened
for three years, until I finally said something to my parents, who put a stop to all
this. My parents eventually received an
apology from the district on this.
I received my first hearing aid at 13. It
was amazing what I had missed. It was the
first time I heard a bird, and I remember
my mom crying when I said something
about the bird making noise. I graduated
with good grades and attended Brigham
Young University. There I ran into problems prevalent at all universities: They
wouldn’t let me major in what I wanted
and kept shuttling me around. After four
years I gave up.
I met my husband at college. We moved
to Pittsburgh, Pa., when he graduated. We
raised three great children there. After 12
years I decided I had to get a degree or get
stuck in menial jobs all my life. I enrolled
at the University of Pittsburgh.
My hearing loss intensified as I matured, but I lost almost all of it by 1991
and had a cochlear implant, which failed.
So I had to learn ASL, American Sign
Language, to be able to get information in
school.
I used ASL through my bachelor’s
degree and my master’s degree. When
I started my Ph.D. work, I started using
CART personnel in my classrooms more
often.
I set a number of ‘firsts’: graduating with a bachelors in Neuroscience
and getting accepted to the Center for Neuroscience at the University of Pittsburgh for graduate work.
One of my advisors noticed, in her classes,
the difference between what I was ‘getting’ with CART services versus what I
would ‘get’ from my interpreters. She said
that half the time I looked totally confused with interpreters, swinging my head
around trying to get info from lipreading
other students and my advisor who was
teaching the class; I would look at the
board and watch my interpreters to get
what I could out of them.
I often had to work much harder than
everyone else in order to receive only part
of the info. My advisor suggested that I
look into this as a research topic. It hadn’t
been done, especially in the sciences
or math, which is significantly different
than topics like history; the vocabulary
and concepts are a lot harder to convey.
I finished my Ph.D. in science education
in 2009.
Currently, I work at several universities
teaching a variety of sciences to hearing
students, which I enjoy thoroughly.
So now, the Deaf person is teaching eight classes on different sciences. I
teach all hearing students ... nursing stu-
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REPORTING
dents, anatomy/physiology, environmental health, meteorology, geology, and I’ve
taught physics, chemistry, and cell biology
labs.
One last Note
Karen Sadler’s e-mails contain the
footer, “Ethical axioms are found and tested not very differently from the axioms of
science. Truth is what stands the test of
experience. ~Albert Einstein.”
Part II will share the results of Karen
Sadler’s Ph.D. studies.
JCR Contributing Editor, Monette Benoit,
B.B.A., CRI, CPE, may be reached at www.
CRRboks.com or www.ARTCS.com.
IN YOUR OWN WORDS
In the Mind of a
CART Provider
By Tess Crowder
I
truly believe that the mind of a
CART Provider must be wired differently from those in other professions. The way we hear and process
words and sounds and information in
our everyday life is truly unique, I would
venture to say.
The words that are typed through our
fingers have been so indelibly drilled into
our heads that the brain processes this
information in a mechanical type of way.
How many times have we been typing for
hours as our mind wanders to our dinner
plans, our families, our responsibilities,
our vacations, our relationships, and so
on. Yet, our notes are perfectly typed for
all to see.
After a full day of typing, sometimes
this mechanical thinking continues as I
listen to the radio on the way home. Instead of comprehending the meaning of
the words, my mind is in “steno mode,”
and the comprehension is left out of the
process. I have counted numerous times
that I have waited for the traffic report,
only to realize they just finished the report which was processed mechanically
— “stenotyped” — in my head, with the
comprehension element left out of the
equation.
It is interesting to hear conversations
from CART providers and captioners discussing and critiquing the speech of others
30
— and our likes and dislikes and judgment
of others based on their articulation of the
spoken word.
During conversations we often interrupt to ask how an unfamiliar word or
name is spelled, and we are diligent in
adding this term to our dictionary. Similarly, when we come across a word in our
reading materials, we need to determine
how this word is pronounced so that we
can properly incorporate this word in our
software. We constantly challenge ourselves to come up with simple ways of
writing words — “I can write this word in
one stroke!” We are very excited over our
creativity and ingenuity.
I believe the following observations are
true not only during our workday, but also
in our everyday lives because of our mindset and our profession:
• When we come across a name, especially a common name, spelled in a very
unusual way, we cringe as we search for
a combination of letters to stroke on our
steno machine that would not conflict
with any other words or names or phrases.
Examples: Mary, Marye, Mari, Maree, Maryee,
Marri, Mairee, Mairy
Kathy, Kathie, Kathi, Kathee, Cathy, Cathie,
Cathi, Cathee
• When major global events take
place, why is it that it never involves a
name like Smith or Jones as opposed to Ahmadinejad or Umar Farouk Abulutallab?
• When attending meetings and public events, we pray that whoever the next
speaker from the audience might be can
speak distinct and clear English, as opposed to a heavy regional or foreign accent, especially when it comes to medical
or technical terminology.
• When we are exposed to a conversation with multiple speakers all talking
at once, our blood pressure rises. We find
there are no listeners, all talkers. In a
working situation, this could send us right
over the edge if we are not able to let it go
and simply type, (Everybody is speaking at
the same time), or (Overlapping conversations), or something to that effect.
• As speakers produce audible noises
and sounds, we scramble to instantaneously find accurate ways to describe and
interpret these sounds in our own words,
usually within fractions of a second, while
keeping up with all of the spoken words
before, after, and during these sounds.
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• With good reason, we avoid auctioneers and speed speakers. They send
our brains into overload. Remember the
FedEx commercial from years ago?
• We also have our quiet speakers:
their voice barely rises above a whisper,
and they just can’t or won’t speak into a
microphone. I find it amazing how many
people believe we all have bionic ears.
• Next we have the speaker who likes
to combine speed, an accent, technical
terminology, not speaking into the mic,
and talks over all the other speakers in
the room — this sends us right to “happy
hour” any time of the day or night.
• We give thanks for not being the
CART Provider or captioner on duty
when Robin Williams or Ozzie Ozbourne
appears on television or radio.
Best of all, we have our speakers who
will speak clearly, audibly, at a slow to
moderate speed, with no new technical
terminology or proper names, and will
take their turns — which gives us the confidence and self-assurance that we can do
a good job and continue on another day in
this fast-paced, stress-filled but interesting
and enjoyable profession of ours.
Now, I understand these are generalizations, and I speak from my own experience. I know my thoughts are not necessarily yours, but I believe I am not alone. If
you would like to share your thoughts and
experiences of living the life as a CART
provider or a captioner, please e-mail me
at [email protected].
Tess Crowder, RPR, CRR, CBC, CCP, is the executive director of Communication Access, Inc., in
Tampa, Fla. She can be reached at tmt.tess@
verizon.net.
A Sobering Experience?
Q. Okay. Do you drink alcohol?
A. No.
Q. Have you ever?
A. Yes.
Q. When did you stop?
A. Shortly after I had my first kid.
Q. Yeah. That’s usually when it starts.
Jim Woitalla, RDR
Minnetonka, Minn.
TECHNOLOGY
T E C H
R E P O R T
Wireless Realtime – Is It
for You?
By Sandy Bunch VanderPol
W
ireless realtime makes your life simple and provides
added benefit to your client. Yes, it’s definitely for you
and your clients!
We all have experienced over the last two decades
promoting realtime delivery through the serial communication method, our COM port (9-pin connection). We’ve
packed and carried to our workplace our send cables, our receive cables, our BlackBox Digital Sharing Device, Multi-Line
Block, our green, gold, gray, ivory and purple adapters for many
years, only to find within the last decade we’ve had to adjust to
the computers that are manufactured without that serial COM
port, forcing us to find the solution of the USB-to-Serial adapter.
This change in hardware production forced us to learn to load
the USB-to-Serial driver not only on our computers but our clients’ computers. We all know and understand how this type of
troubleshooting can wreak havoc on many reporters’ nerves, even
to the level of many of us throwing up our hands and shouting,
“No more! I quit with the realtime!”
What if I told you that it’s not necessary to troubleshoot the
device manager, COM port assignments, loading drivers and realtime software, confirming that the COM port settings are assigned
appropriately to accept the realtime feed? I’m hoping you might
want to get connected again with realtime, the wireless way.
From a general perspective, at this point in time, realtime reporters have the option to provide realtime wirelessly via two very
distinct methods: WiFi or Bluetooth. Each of these methods is
an efficient, solid, and reliable alternative to cable realtime. Let’s
discuss generally how these two options have their advantages to
you and your client.
Bluetooth and WiFi realtime are to very distinct methods of
providing realtime wirelessly. The definition of WiFi realtime,
simply defined, is the ability to send our realtime feed through a
Local Area Network (LAN) or Access point (AP) and for the end
users to connect to this LAN/AP through their wireless option on
their computer or via their NIC (network interface card). Stenograph’s CaseView Net has a turnkey product for the Stenograph
user, supplying the router (with four Ethernet connections), secure software, and training. Advantage Software, via their Bridge
realtime software, and through the environment of Folder Share,
also allows for WiFi realtime for most CAT products. Advantage
Software’s Teleview product is also a product worth investigating
for the Eclipse user. ProCat’s Denoto WiFi realtime is also a turnkey solution for ProCat users. As you can tell, our CAT vendors
are providing various options to the profession for promoting WiFi
realtime to our clients.
The court reporter’s definition of Bluetooth realtime is the
ability to provide a realtime feed through “paired” devices (point
A to point B). Think of your cellular phone and your Bluetooth
32
earphones. That’s an example of how Bluetooth realtime works
through StenoCast products, device to device. Of note, however,
is StenoCast, which is a serial product and must be assigned the
appropriate COM port to receive the realtime. No cables are necessary. As the reporter, you use a “transmitter” via a USB port to
send the realtime and your client uses a “receiver,” which is paired
with the transmitter. Both transmitter and receiver use the serial
communication and you must assign both the transmitter and receiver to the appropriate COM port in your CAT and your client’s
realtime software.
What are the advantages of providing realtime via WiFi to your clients?
WiFi Option:
• Instant refresh to your end user.
• Late connections to your realtime allow for client to get the
entire transcript.
• Less troubleshooting (No COM ports to assign through Device Manager; no drivers to load; no bad cables or MultiLine Blocks).
• Auto Reconnects to realtime (no need to shut down your
realtime file to troubleshoot).
• All users connected to the router may have Internet access
if an established connection is plugged into the router.
• CaseView Net is compatible with Cradlepoint router — a
router that is compatible with your Air Card and allows up
to 17 hookups and gives them access to the Internet via
your Air Card while at the same time accepting your realtime feed.
• Run CaseView Net and/or Bridge from a thumbdrive — no
need to load the software on client’s computer.
• Not necessary for the reporter to “touch” the client’s computer — easy to set up, so your clients can do it themselves.
• Allows for simultaneous realtime output via WiFi and via
cables or StenoCast Bluetooth, if necessary.
What are the advantages of providing realtime via StenoCast Bluetooth to your clients?
StenoCast Bluetooth Option: So as not to confuse StenoCast
Bluetooth realtime with a WiFi realtime setup, let me explain that
StenoCast’s Bluetooth realtime feed is accomplished through a
serial feed, thus you are required, as I addressed earlier, to identify
the COM port assigned to both your CAT computer and the client’s computer for the receiver. Additionally, loading a driver on
your client’s computer for the StenoCast receiver to successfully
receive your realtime feed is necessary. Loading the driver can be
accomplished through a thumbdrive, CD, or StenoCast’s Web
site. Loading this driver is very simple and fast.
StenoCast has recently developed the RED (Refresh-enabled
device) transmitter. This RED device allows instant refresh for
most CAT programs.
• Instant refresh to your clients (with the RED transmitter
and with most, but not all, CAT software — Case CATalyst
not compatible for refresh with RED.)
• No cables and Multi-Line Block device equates to less troubleshooting.
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technology
• Run Bridge realtime software from
a thumbdrive with StenoCast Bluetooth.
I provide this information as a first stop
in your research. It is not be all-inclusive
but is intended to give basic information. I
encourage readers to find out more about
these products, including pricing, by contacting the vendors.
Sandy Bunch VanderPol, RMR, CRR, is a certified Realtime Systems Administrator from Lotus, Calif., and a member of NCRA’s Technology
Evaluation Committee. She can be reached at
[email protected].
T E C H
T I P S
Search Like an
Expert
By Dharmesh Shah
I
f you’re like me, you probably use
Google many times a day. But, chances are, unless you are a technology
geek, you probably still use Google in
its simplest form. If your current use
of Google is limited to typing a few words
in, and changing your query until you find
what you’re looking for, then I’m here to
tell you that there’s a better way — and
it’s not hard to learn. On the other hand,
if you are a technology geek and can use
Google like the best of them already, then
I suggest you keep handy this article of
Google search tips. You’ll then have the
tips on hand when you are ready to pull
your hair out in frustration when watching
a neophyte repeatedly type in basic queries
in a desperate attempt to find something.
The following Google search tips are
based on my own experience and things
that I actually find useful. The list is by
no means comprehensive. But I assure
you that by learning and using the 12 tips
below, you’ll rank up there with the best
of the Google experts out there. I’ve kept
the descriptions of the search tips intentionally terse as you’re likely to grasp most
of these simply by looking at the example
from Google.
1. Explicit Phrase: Let’s say you are
looking for content about Internet marketing. Instead of just typing Internet marketing into the Google search box, you will
likely be better off searching explicitly for
the phrase. To do this, simply enclose the
search phrase within double quotes.
Example: “Internet marketing”
2. Exclude Words: Let’s say you want
to search for content about Internet marketing, but you want to exclude any results
that contain the term advertising. To do
this, simply use the “–” sign in front of the
word you want to exclude.
Example Search: Internet marketing –
advertising
3. Site Specific Search: Often, you
want to search a specific Web site for
content that matches a certain phrase.
Even if the site doesn’t support a builtin search feature, you can use Google to
search the site for your term. Simply use
the “site:somesite.com” modifier.
Example:
“Internet
marketing”
site:www.smallbusinesshub.com
4. Similar Words and Synonyms:
Let’s say you are want to include a word
in your search, but want to include results
that contain similar words or synonyms. To
do this, use the “~” in front of the word.
Example: “Internet marketing” ~professional
5. Specific Document Types: If you’re
looking to find results that are of a specific
document type, you can use the modifier
“filetype:”. For example, you might want
to find only PowerPoint presentations related to Internet marketing.
Example:
“Internet
marketing”
filetype:ppt
6. This OR That: By default, when
you do a search, Google will include all
the terms specified in the search. If you are
looking for any one of one or more terms
to match, then you can use the OR operator. (Note: The OR has to be capitalized).
Example: Internet marketing OR advertising
7. Phone Listing: Let’s say someone
calls you on your mobile number and
you don’t know how it is. If all you have
is a phone number, you can look it up on
Google using the phonebook feature.
Example: phonebook: 617-555-1212
(note: the provided number does not work
— you’ll have to use a real number to get
any results).
8. Area Code Lookup: If all you need
to do is to look-up the area code for a
phone number, just enter the 3-digit area
code and Google will tell you where it’s
from.
Example: 617
9. Numeric Ranges: This is a rarely
used, but highly useful tip. Let’s say you
want to find results that contain any of a
range of numbers. You can do this by using
the “X..Y” modifier (in case this is hard
to read, what’s between the X and Y are
two periods). This type of search is useful
for years (as shown below), prices, or anywhere where you want to provide a series
of numbers.
Example: president 1940..1950
10. Stock (Ticker Symbol): Just enter
a valid ticker symbol as your search term
and Google will give you the current financials and a quick thumb-nail chart for
the stock.
Example: GOOG
11. Calculator: The next time you
need to do a quick calculation, instead of
bringing up the Calculator applet, you can
just type your expression in to Google.
Example: 48512 * 1.02
12. Word Definitions: If you need to
quickly look up the definition of a word or
phrase, simply use the “define:” command.
Example: define:plethora
I hope this list of Google search tips
proves useful in your future Google
searches.
Dharmesh Shah is founder and chief technology officer of HubSpot, an Internet marketing
company. This article is reprinted with permission and can be viewed online at http://blog.
hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/1264/12Quick-Tips-To-Search-Google-Like-An-Expert.aspx.
T E C H
R E P O R T
Un-Wired: Systems to Control
the Wires in
Your Life
By Marybeth Everhart
W
ires, wires, and more wires
— our wireless world seems
chock full of them! Every one
of those fun toys and gadgets
we can’t live without has one
— cell phone, MP3 player, PDA, BlueTooth earbud, DSi, digital camera, you
name it. Every single one has a power
cord, and since one is not compatible with
the other, we cannot even share the cord
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33
TECHNOLOGY
and simply take turns charging them up.
One way to reduce the cord clutter — let’s
face it, we’ll likely never eliminate it altogether — is to purchase one of the new
charging pads or charging mats available.
There are several to choose from and
they appear to be as handy as a pocket on
a shirt, but there are a few things to know
about them. Let’s have a look.
Powermat Home and Office
Powermat Home & Office charges up
to three devices simultaneously, plus has
a USB plug, with various tips, to charge
a fourth. Simply place the items in the
right position on the Powermat, which
you’ll know from the cute little tone it
makes, and voila, instant connection. Let
the charging begin. Sounds great, right?
Here’s the catch:
1. The Powermat is roughly $100, give
or take $5 depending on where you purchase it.
2. Each device needs a special sensor,
typically going where the standard battery goes on that particular device. Some
items, like the iPhone, require a special
34
case, or sleeve, since they do not have removable batteries.
3. Each sensor runs $30-$40, so by the
time your three devices are Powermatready, you’re close to $200.
The benefits:
1. It eliminates that rat’s nest of cords
we see on so many desks these days.
2. It draws less power than a standard
power cord, so it saves energy. Since all
those cords continue to draw power even
when no device is connected, one Powermat will pull less electricity than one standard cord, not to mention multiple ones.
3. There’s also a portable version for
the same price for the frequent traveler.
Duracell has the MyGrid charging
mat, which will charge up to four devices
at once and offers the PowerClip as an alternative to a special sleeve. The starter
kit, which includes the mat and one PowerClip, is around $70, with the special
sleeves and sensors costing $35 each.
So, for a charging mat or pad of some
description and the special sensors,
sleeves, or discs for three devices, your
minimum investment is around $125 and
as high as $200-$250. And keep in mind,
that’s just for three devices. I don’t know
about you, but each member of my household has at least three devices that need
charging. My eight-year-old alone has five!
WildCharger Pad
Other options
WildCharge Products has the WildCharger pad, which weighs in at approximately $60, and $35 per device adapter.
Or, for just $20, you can get their new
PowerDisc attachment and eliminate the
“special sleeves” necessary for the batteryless devices. The PowerDisc comes complete with a lanyard because — well, I
guess we just can’t have enough of those!
Charge4all makes a Travel Charging Folio and a Portable Charging Mat.
They’re not wireless but are compact, convenient and, quite frankly, neat and tidy.
Each can charge up to four devices and
are the same system; just one is the foldup travel version. Here’s how they work:
Each Charge4all has a charging tube with
four ports. You plug the charging tube into
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TECHNOLOGY
an outlet, and then plug your devices into
the ports using the SmartCharging Plugs
that come with the Charge4all. These are
basically short cords with various plugs to
connect to an iPhone/iPod, Micro USB,
Mini USB for Blackberry and Motorola,
Samsung SCH, and LG Chocolate.
So, if I have to plug my devices into the
charger, you say, why not just maintain the
status quo? Well, for one, you have only
one power cord for the Charge4all, and the
other cords that plug into the devices are
short, so the devices lie close to the charging tube and the cords are neat and tidy,
not all tangled.
Then, there’s what is known as a
charging station, which comes in various shapes, sizes, and colors/finishes,
and is available almost everywhere these
days, from Target to TJ Maxx to Staples.
It’s inexpensive and at least keeps things
somewhat organized. After reading about
these products, I happened to be in the local office supply store and stumbled across
a nice, white, 3-device charging station
for $9.90 plus tax. So, for just over $30,
my husband, daughter, and I each have
our own station, which included a power
strip that tucks neatly in the back and has
a power switch with an indicator light so
you know when it’s on. Those of you who
have ever attended one of my seminars
know how strongly I feel about those indicator lights! Now, three devices have happy little homes, with their cords tucked
away out of sight, and I have the ability to
simply turn the power strip on or off at my
convenience, thus saving electricity and
maintaining what shred of sanity I may
have left.
And, of course, when all else fails,
there’s the plain old power strip. No bells,
no whistles, but inexpensive, easy to find,
and needs no owner’s manual.
Marybeth Everhart, RPR, CRI, is a member of
NCRA’s Technology Evaluation Committee.
T E C H N O L O GY
N E W S
The Technology News column provides summaries of articles and reports on
products, technologies, and general tech-
Finally a Comprehensive
Manual on Punctuation
for Court Reporters
nological information. NCRA does not
endorse or critically review the products
and services in any way.
iBlaze 3.0 Released
CT Summation, a litigation workflow
and eDiscovery solutions provider, released iBlaze 3.0, the latest generation of
its electronic document management and
production tool. According to the press
release, iBlaze allows attorneys, paralegals,
and all legal professionals to manage electronically stored information from case assessment through production.
iBlaze allows users to control all documents, electronic evidence, exhibits, and
transcripts from initial review through
production. New features and functionalities of iBlaze 3.0 include: • fast, accurate redactions.
• deposition and transcript analysis.
• document family feature.
• near-native document view. • TIFF-on-the-fly.
More information is available at the
CT Summation Web site (http://www.
summation.com/).
NEW!
“Court Reporting:
Bad Grammar/Good
Punctuation”
Member Price: $59.95
Regular Price: $69.95
Purchase today!
You can find this book online at,
www.NCRAonline.org/store,
or call 800-272-6272.
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35
BUSINESS
Y O U ,
I N C .
Networking: Is It Worth
the Cost?
That company had no idea who I was, but the person leading the team on that job was going to be
Mary, whom I’d met at the HLAA convention in
By Darlene Pickard
Atlanta. Mary vouched for my skills and recom-
uite frequently I have heard people questioning the value
of attending the NCRA conventions. There is no doubt
that the monetary cost of airfare, hotel, food, convention
registration, as well as time away from work, can add up
to a substantial cost. But is it “worth” it? I do not wish to
preach to anyone in this article. This is simply my story. I just want
to share the progression of my career and NCRA’s involvement in
it. In an effort not to be a name-dropper or inadvertently forget
to mention someone, I will refer to generic names to illustrate my
point.
My first convention was in New York City in 1991 when I
was a baby freelance reporter. My friend and I had just graduated from court reporting school in Southern California together
and had passed our RPRs. We brought our spouses along with us;
and, while we attended seminars, the boys went out and did whatever boys do. We spent the days in the seminars and the evenings
out with our husbands exploring New York City. Neither of us
had ever attended a business conference before. We were excited
about our new licenses and new jobs and were simply thrilled to
come to New York and see how much there was to tap into and
how wonderful and professional and fun the people were from
around the country. We returned home and hit the ground running and both got very busy very quickly.
It was a couple of years before I decided to attend another
convention. My second one took place in Kansas City, Mo. This
time I attended alone. At first it was a little awkward not knowing
anybody, but I quickly discovered that court reporters are a chatty
bunch, and I was able to meet new people very quickly. I went to
a realtime seminar and introduced myself to the presenter afterwards just to say that I had enjoyed the session. We shall call her
“Jane.” She asked where I was from, and I mentioned that I would
soon be relocating from Southern California to the Seattle area. It
turns out that Jane was from Seattle at that time. She gave me her
contact information and said to give her a call when I got there.
Not wanting to waste a good connection, I called when I got to
Seattle. I had been writing realtime for a couple of years, but I
had not provided CART. After much encouragement (read that as
arm-twisting), I agreed to give it a try. Jane mentored me and recommended me to the local university. I have worked as a CART
provider at that university for the past 15 years. It turns out Jane
was training her replacement, and our professional friendship continued even after she left the Seattle area.
Through the association of that relationship, I was asked to
provide CART onsite for the HLAA (then SHHH) annual conventions. At the HLAA convention in Atlanta, I became acquainted with and worked alongside Mary. (Stay with me here,
and you’ll see that there is a point to this foundational information.) Fast forward to 2002: A student I was providing CART for
mended that the company go ahead and give me a
Q
36
chance, and so they brought me on board.
mentioned that he was going to attend the AG Bell convention
that summer in Anaheim. I called AG Bell to see who was going
to be providing CART for the convention. I then contacted that
CART company and expressed my interest in being on the CART
team. That company had no idea who I was, but the person leading the team on that job was going to be Mary, whom I’d met at
the HLAA convention in Atlanta. Mary vouched for my skills and
recommended that the company go ahead and give me a chance,
and so they brought me on board.
My career has skyrocketed since then. Thankfully, I was always busy doing local onsite work. But once I started working
with these teams of CART providers from around the country,
the networking grew my business at least three-fold. In addition
to the local onsite classroom CART jobs, I began providing CART
remotely through the company that hired me for the AG Bell job.
Shortly after that, I began captioning. The foot in the door with
the captioning companies I work for came through the relationships that I had made with Jane and Mary.
Am I trying to say that it’s all in who you know? Absolutely
not. All that gets you is name recognition and a foot in the door.
Work still has to be done by the individual to have the skill set to
keep that door open. While my network of colleagues was growing, I became more determined to earn my CRR, CBC, and CCP.
The more you associate with people who are invested in continually furthering their skills and careers, the more you want to do
the same.
So was it worth the time and money I spent to go to the conventions in New York and Kansas City? Trust me when I say I really didn’t have the disposable income to go to those conventions.
I can’t remember exactly what I learned from the seminars there,
but I can tell you that every single job that I have now came from
that contacts I made there. I’d say that was unquestionably money
well spent. And that girl who went to New York with me 18 years
ago has since moved on from court reporting, but she and her
family have become lifetime friends and our now-grown children
have come to have their own solid friendships with each other.
Value? Priceless.
Darlene Pickard, RDR, CRR, CBC, CCP, is from Marysville, Wash.
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BUSINESS
B U S I N E S S
Sole proprietors own all the as-
Choose a Structure
sets of the business and the
I N
O
ne of the first decisions that you
will have to make as a business
owner is how the company should
be structured. This decision will
have long-term implications, so
consult with an accountant and attorney
to help you select the form of ownership
that is right for you. In making a choice,
you will want to take into account the following:
• Your vision regarding the size and
nature of your business.
• The level of control you wish to
have.
• The level of structure you are willing to deal with.
• The business’s vulnerability to lawsuits.
• Tax implications of the different
ownership structures.
• Expected profit (or loss) of the business.
• Whether or not you need to reinvest
earnings into the business.
• Your need for access to cash out of
the business for yourself.
Sole Proprietorships
The vast majority of small businesses
start out as sole proprietorships. These
firms are owned by one person, usually the
individual who has day-to-day responsibilities for running the business. Sole proprietors own all the assets of the business
and the profits generated by it. They also
assume complete responsibility for any of
its liabilities or debts. In the eyes of the law
and the public, you are one in the same
with the business.
Advantages of a Sole Proprietorship
• Sole proprietorships are the easiest
and least expensive form of ownership to organize.
• Sole proprietors are in complete
control and, within the parameters
of the law, may make decisions as
they see fit.
• Sole proprietors receive all income
generated by the business to keep or
reinvest.
profits generated by it. They
also assume complete responsibility for any of its liabilities or
debts.
•Profits from the business flow directly
to the owner’s personal tax return.
•The business is easy to dissolve, if desired.
Disadvantages of a Sole Proprietorship
• Sole proprietors have unlimited liability and are legally responsible for
all debts against the business. Their
business and personal assets are at
risk.
• Sole proprietorships may be at a disadvantage in raising funds and are
often limited to using funds from
personal savings or consumer loans.
• Sole proprietors may have a hard
time attracting high-caliber employees or those that are motivated by
the opportunity to own a part of the
business.
• Some employee benefits, such as
owner’s medical insurance premiums, are not directly deductible
from business income (only partially
deductible as an adjustment to income).
Partnerships
In a partnership, two or more people
share ownership of a single business. Like
proprietorships, the law does not distinguish between the business and its owners.
The partners should have a legal agreement that sets forth how decisions will
be made, how profits will be shared, how
disputes will be resolved, how future partners will be admitted to the partnership,
how partners can be bought out, and what
steps will be taken to dissolve the partnership when needed. Yes, it’s hard to think
about a breakup when the business is just
getting started, but many partnerships
split up at crisis times, and unless there is a
defined process, there will be even greater
problems. They also must decide up-front
how much time and capital each will contribute, and so forth.
BUSINESS
Advantages of a Partnership
• Partnerships are relatively easy to
establish; however, time should be
invested in developing the partnership agreement.
• With more than one owner, the ability to raise funds may be increased.
• The profits from the business flow
directly through to the partners’
personal tax returns.
• Prospective employees may be attracted to the business if given the
incentive to become a partner.
The business usually will benefit from
partners who have complementary skills.
Disadvantages of a Partnership
• Partners are jointly and individually
liable for the actions of the other
partners.
• Profits must be shared with others.
• Since decisions are shared, disagreements can occur.
• Some employee benefits are not deductible from business income on
tax returns.
• The partnership may have a limited
life; it may end upon the withdrawal
or death of a partner.
Types of Partnerships that should be
considered:
General Partnership
Partners divide responsibility for management and liability as well as the shares
of profit or loss according to their internal agreement. Equal shares are assumed
unless there is a written agreement that
states differently.
Limited Partnership and Partnership with
Limited Liability
Limited means that most of the partners have limited liability (to the extent of
their investment), as well as limited input
regarding management decisions, which
generally encourages investors for shortterm projects or for investing in capital
assets. This form of ownership is not often
used for operating retail or service businesses. Forming a limited partnership is
more complex and formal than that of a
general partnership.
Joint Venture
Acts like a general partnership, but
is clearly for a limited period of time or
a single project. If the partners in a joint
venture repeat the activity, they will be
recognized as an ongoing partnership and
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37
BUSINESS
will have to file as such as well as distribute accumulated partnership assets upon
dissolution of the entity.
Corporations
A corporation chartered by the state
in which it is headquartered is considered
by law to be a unique entity, separate and
apart from those who own it. A corporation can be taxed, it can be sued, and it
can enter into contractual agreements.
The owners of a corporation are its shareholders. The shareholders elect a board of
directors to oversee the major policies and
decisions. The corporation has a life of its
own and does not dissolve when ownership changes.
Advantages of a Corporation
• Shareholders have limited liability
for the corporation’s debts or judgments against the corporations.
• Generally, shareholders can only
be held accountable for their investment in stock of the company.
(Note, however, that officers can be
held personally liable for their actions, such as the failure to withhold
and pay employment taxes.)
• Corporations can raise additional
funds through the sale of stock.
• A corporation may deduct the cost
of benefits it provides to officers and
employees.
• Corporations can elect S corporation status if certain requirements
are met. This election enables company to be taxed similar to a partnership.
Disadvantages of a Corporation
• The process of incorporation requires more time and money than
other forms of organization.
• Corporations are monitored by federal, state, and some local agencies,
and as a result may have more paperwork to comply with regulations.
• Incorporating may result in
higher overall taxes. Dividends
paid to shareholders are not
deductible from business income; thus it can be taxed twice.
Subchapter S Corporations
Subchapter S Corporations are tax
election only; this election enables the
shareholder to treat the earnings and
profits as distributions and have them
pass through directly to their personal tax
A corporation can be taxed, it
M A N A G E M E N T
can be sued, and it can enter
Maximize Your
Time: Achieve
More with Less
into contractual agreements.
return. The catch here is that the shareholder, if working for the company and if
there is a profit, must pay himself or herself
wages and must meet standards of “reasonable compensation.” This can vary by
geographical region as well as occupation,
but the basic rule is to pay yourself what
you would have to pay someone to do your
job, as long as there is enough profit. If you
do not do this, the IRS can reclassify all of
the earnings and profit as wages, and you
will be liable for all of the payroll taxes on
the total amount.
Limited Liability Company (LLC)
The LLC is a relatively new type of
hybrid business structure that is now permissible in most states. It is designed to
provide the limited liability features of a
corporation and the tax efficiencies and
operational flexibility of a partnership.
Formation is more complex and formal
than that of a general partnership.
The owners are members, and the duration of the LLC is usually determined
when the organization papers are filed.
The time limit can be continued, if desired, by a vote of the members at the time
of expiration. LLCs must not have more
than two of the four characteristics that
define corporations: Limited liability to
the extent of assets, continuity of life, centralization of management, and free transferability of ownership interests.
In summary, deciding the form of ownership that best suits your business venture
should be given careful consideration. Use
your key advisers to assist you in the process.
This information is provided by the U.S. Small
Business Administration and was available at
http://www.sba.gov/smallbusinessplanner/
start/choosastructure/START_FORMS_OWNERSHIP.html. The Web site of the Small Business Administration provides useful information and aid to people as they start up and
manage their businesses.
By Joelle Jay, Ph.D.
I
magine you had three extra hours
this week to devote to your own improvement as a leader. What kind of
difference do you think that would
have on your effectiveness, accomplishments, and long-term success? Or
imagine you had half a day this week to
catch up on some of the backlogged work
that never seems to get done. How would
that help you clear the way to your bigger goals? Or what if you had a whole day
off this week to use for rest and renewal?
What would you do? Do you suppose that
would make you feel more refreshed? How
would a dose of restoration affect your
mood, your thinking, your relationships,
and your decisions?
Each of us can think of valuable ways
to spend our time, and chances are some
of those ideas are more valuable than the
ways you’re spending your time right now.
The fact is that when you maximize your
time, you actually do have more hours in
the day. So if you’ve ever wondered when
things would slow down, you’re in luck.
The time is now!
The key is to take advantage of shortcut strategies for maximizing your time.
Following are five “shortcuts” that will
dramatically reduce the time you spend
racing around the fast track so you can
exit into a life of leading and living well.
1. Modeling: In many industries,
modeling is a strategy used to mock
up an end product before investing the time, effort and expense
required to complete it. Your time
may be the most precious resource
you have; make a model before you
go out and spend it. Figure out what
the ideal schedule would look like.
Sit down with a pencil and a sheet
of paper and sketch the way you’d
like the next stretch of time to look.
In just a few minutes you can design
your ideal week — or for that matter, your ideal day, month, or year. It
will take time to turn the model into
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
39
BUSINESS
reality, but now you know what’s
possible. You may actually find creating the “real thing” to be easier
than you think.
The fact is that when you maxi-
2. Define Your Time: You can define
your time by thinking about the
various activities that take your
time and grouping them together.
Start with the basics, such as meeting days (when you are available to
meet with other people), work days
(those you keep to yourself to do
your own work), flex days (to have
a cushion for spillover activities),
administrative days (for catching up
on paperwork and other administrative tasks), and days off (for rest and
renewal). If a whole day seems too
long to devote to a single kind of
work, then go by half days or even
two-hour blocks. You can make
your days as specific as you want.
If you don’t define your days, then
every day you bounce around from
one activity to another to another,
all day long. Time is lost as you try
if you’ve ever wondered when
mize your time, you actually do
have more hours in the day. So
things would slow down, you’re
in luck. The time is now!
to transition from a high-energy activity to one that requires you to be
calm and quiet. You have a harder
time getting focused because you’re
constantly changing the focus. In
contrast, defining your time allows
you to get into one mindset for a
particular type of activity and stay
there. You can find your rhythm and
get into a groove so you actually accomplish more in less time.
3. Make Appointments with Yourself: You make appointments with
clients, and you keep them. You
schedule time with your boss, and
you show up. You commit to meet-
ARE YOU READY TO SELL?
Join my court reporting firm and a few others
for the purpose of offering our combined
businesses for sale to a major buyer at a fair
market value. We need volume to attract a
major buyer. The more gross business we can
offer, the better the opportunity for all of us.
We will all remain independent while
pursuing our common goal.
If your office is within 50 miles of Washington, D.C.
including Baltimore and other Maryland locations and
Northern Virginia, and you are interested (or just
curious), contact Jerry at 310-463-9854 or
[email protected] for details. He is a seasoned
business consultant who has assisted in the purchase
and sale of high profile court reporting
businesses for many years. He is well acquainted with
the industry and with the buyers, and will keep
your identity and information strictly confidential.
40
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
ings, and you attend. Now apply
the same concept to yourself. Set a
meeting with a specific purpose and
be there to get the job done. You
don’t have to set a recurring meeting
that happens every week. You might
just need to make one appointment
to do some quality thinking or make
some important phone calls that
keep getting brushed aside. The
important part of this strategy isn’t
the “what” or the “when” or the
“how many” of the appointments.
The important part of this strategy
is the fact that you recognize there’s
something specific you want to do,
decide when you’re going to do it,
and schedule the time. Keep that
appointment and you’ll have the
time you need – guaranteed.
4. Breaking Time Rules: Whether we
know it or not, we are all operating
on unspoken time rules, such as:
• You must work eight to ten hours
per day.
• You must take time off on Saturdays
and Sundays.
• You must be available by phone and
e-mail at all times.
• You must take vacations in full-day
or full-week increments. But you
can escape the rules of time. How
you spend your time is a choice. For
instance, maybe you’d rather leave
work every day at 3:00 p.m. but
work six days a week. Maybe you’d
rather get a long massage once a
month instead of taking a full-week
vacation. Start defining the length
of your workday by the results you
achieve instead of the hours you
work. Time rules don’t necessarily mean working less, but they do
mean working with more freedom
and choice.
If you think this won’t work in
your company, the first question
is, “Have you checked?” A host of
creative work options are available
as people and their companies look
for ways to use time in a way that
works for them. And if not, there
are plenty of creative ways for you to
break time rules within your existing
agreements. Ask for what you want.
Make a proposal. If you’re willing
to be fair, negotiate and persist, you
BUSINESS
will be surprised at how accommodating others will be.
5. Replace Multitasking with “Unitasking”: Multitasking is a fact of
life in a high-speed world. And it
does work to help you manage complex, non-linear tasks, like being
available to people whenever they
need you, staying on top of “moving
targets,” and handling phone calls
and requests that come in at random. But recognize the impact multitasking has on you. Your actions
become fragmented, your thinking
is interrupted, you make hasty decisions and you do things poorly. To
get the focus you need to be effective in achieving your vision, try
replacing it with “unitasking.” The
whole strategy is this: do one thing
at a time. Doing one thing at a time
— even for a short time — improves
concentration, calms you down,
and allows you to get more done in
less time. Considering that on average only about three minutes out of
every hour are used with maximum
focus, you can improve your “concentration rate” in just five minutes at a time. Then fifteen. Then
twenty. You don’t have to unitask all
the time, just when it counts, like
when you are strategizing, visioning,
goal-setting, brainstorming, planning, and having one-on-one conversations. These are the kinds of
activities that benefit from unitasking. Unitasking communicates a
respect for the people and processes
that deserve your full attention. As
much as you possibly can, practice
doing one thing at a time. Set the
time aside, focus, concentrate, and
you’ll get your tasks done both fast
and well.
Accomplish More in Less Time
You will never have control of your
time until you take control of it. So while
your day will still consist of 24 hours just
like it always has, when you implement
these five shortcuts you’ll feel like you accomplish more because the time you use
will be most productive. Therefore, stop
long enough to get a handle on how you
want to spend your time, and then implement these new ways to maximize the time
you do have. Rethinking your relationship
to time takes an open mind, it takes commitment, and (ironically) it takes time.
But the investment you make in it will pay
you back hour after precious hour. You’ll
find that you’ll achieve more progress and
fulfillment in all areas of your life – and in
less time than you ever imagined.
Joelle K. Jay, Ph.D., is president of the leadership development practice, Pillar Consulting.
As an executive coach, author, and speaker,
Joelle helps leaders achieve top performance
and business results. Her clients include presidents, vice presidents, and C-level executives in
Fortune 500 companies. Joelle is the author of
The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal
Leadership. To find out how Joelle can help
you reach the next level both personally and
professionally, e-mail: [email protected] or visit: www.Pillar-consulting.com.
A Student,
a Scholarship, and NCRF
NCRF recognizes that court reporting students face unique challenges when
pursuing their education and career. Thus, we award thousands of dollars every
year to students through the Student Intern and Frank Sarli Memorial
Scholarships as well as the New Professional Reporter Grant.
Stephanie Fernandez, past Student Intern Scholarship
winner, provided us with this update:
“I was just informed that I passed the California CSR,
and I’ll soon be starting a rewarding career. In fact,
I’ve already been offered a position as a deposition
reporter. I’m very excited to begin my career, and I
know any success I enjoy will be due in part to the
generous support of the NCRF.”
Please contact Mary Rodriguez at
800-272-6272, ext. 152, or e-mail
[email protected], for more
information on NCRF’s scholarship program.
NCRF
NCRF — the foundation for court reporting philanthropy
National
Court Reporters
Foundation
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41
C r o s s w o r d
Inky Pinky
In the game of Inky Pinky, one player
offers a concise, clear definition and the
second player must translate that definition into two words that rhyme. The first
player indicates the number of syllables
in each word by saying “Ink-Pink” for
one-syllable words, “Inky Pinky” for twosyllable words, “Inkity Pinkity” for three
syllable words, and son on. Thus a large
dried fruit (Ink Pink) is a big fig, an unreliable dill (Inky Pinky) is a fickle pickle, and
a yearly handbook (Inkity Pinkity) is an
annual manual.
ACROSS
1 Voznesensky work The Triangular —
5 Cartoonist for “Fox Trot” ­
10Croupier’s offering
14Competent
15 Liver-giver, e.g.
16 The Bee Gees, e.g.
17Bullwinkle unpenned?
19Peck’s right-hand man?
20Smirk jerks?
21Representatives
23Sound in a NOTE?
24Facial expression
25Hoists
28Where people SLIDE for lunch?
30Mermaid: a deep- ___fish?
33Anti-harm charm?
35Come face-to-face
36Poke in the ribs, playfully
37Morley Callaghan PR man Harry
38Quantrill’s actions
40One-horse box sleigh
41Can material
42Butt scut?
43A pang that rhymes with 31 Down?
45Leader of the Family Stone
46Sat in the hammock, e.g.
48Signed on the line
49Puts mettle to the pedal?
51Actor Ray of The Marrying Kind
53Artist’s workplace
55Light breads
59When stepped on, the grape let out a
little___?
60Delicate Moby?
62Tennis’s palindromic poster girl?
63Dainty netting
64Mona in a SAIL?
65Cuts a check
66Twirls and whirls
67Pizzazz
42
DOWN
1 People to run LAPS with?
2 Black, to Browning
3 Socotra island export
4 Colonize again
5 Classified writers?
6 Tied against the tide?
7 Baseball’s Slaughter
8 Undesirable answers
9 Like ethereal DIAMETERS?
10__ side of the coin
11Intoxicated Pepe LePew?
12Force or effort
13TOSS ’em in the tank?
18Worn and torn?
22Matter of the matter
24Snowgoer
25Comes to a standstill
26Go e-postal?
27Humorous Bugs?
29Rousseau novel
31A joint that rhymes with 43 Across?
32Trimmed a curbing
34Quid pro quos?
39Feels poorly
40Game played with 48 cards
42Idyll idol?
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
44A woman with an angel for a husband?
47Region of eastern Panama
50Gray matter creations
52Songs in a STILL?
53Exchange PAWS?
54Singer Turner
55Island east of Java
56Greet the sleet?
57Lohengrin’s bride
58Penn’s not SANE?
61Sleepy Hollow character
The solution to this month’s crossword
puzzle will appear in the April 2010 JCR.
This crossword puzzle appears in the book
Crosswords Word Play by Richard Lederer
and Gayle Dean.
Veterans at AIB VHP Day.
Jane Weingart, veteran Howard Hall,
and Bob Day.
Court reporter Cindy Miller and veteran Harold Vokoun.
44
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
By
M.
Jane
Weingart
Preserving history may often be an overlooked part of a court reporter’s job. But
some events, such as the Veterans History
Day put on by one court reporting college,
reinforce the lasting and important role
the written word plays in our lives.
“
T
his Veterans Day — November 11, 2009 — will be one that we will
remember forever!” exclaimed Dean and Evelyn Lloyd of Coon Rapids, Iowa, who participated in the first Veterans History Day held at
AIB College. Morris “Dean” Lloyd served in the Navy Seabees in
World War II at Iwo Jima.
Twenty-three veterans and their families came to the first AIB Veterans
History Project on November 11 at the AIB campus to give their oral histories about their wartime service to individual volunteer Iowa reporters.
AIB was proud to partner with the Iowa Court Reporters Association
for this first event in Iowa.
The Veterans History Project
Videographer
Wes Nygren,
Veterans Howard
and Marian
Anderson, and
Videographer
Nancy Nygren.
The U.S. Congress created the VHP in 2000 as part of the American
Folklife Center at the Library of Congress — one of the world’s most respected research and cultural institutions. Approximately 1,900 personal
interviews have been transcribed by court reporters through NCRF’s partnership with the Library of Congress.
The mission of the project is to collect and archive the personal recollections of U.S. wartime veterans to honor their service and share their
stories with current and future generations. Also included in the project
are stories from home front civilians who worked in support of our armed
forces.
M. Jane Weingart, RMR, is a freelance court reporter in Burlington, Iowa. She is past
president of the Iowa Court Reporters Association. She chairs the Board of Trustees
at AIB College.
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45
Court reporter Josie Johnson,
interviewer Karl Fenton of AIB,
Veteran H. Gene Hertel, and
videographer Amanda Zuck.
Getting Started
E
arly in the fall, a committee was
formed to implement and oversee the VHP at AIB. Past ICRA
presidents, Bob and Pam Day (now
retired official court reporters),
co-chaired the project. Bob also is a veteran who served in the Army and Army
Reserves. Additional committee members were AIB College President Nancy
Williams, Kay Smith, longtime instructor
at AIB College, as well as Kris Mattoon,
Mary Ann Nielsen, and José de Jesus of
AIB. I was also on the committee in behalf
of ICRA and AIB.
The goal was to assemble as many
veterans as possible, in one afternoon, to
give their oral histories. Twenty-three veterans and their families came to the AIB
campus on Fleur Drive and participated
in the afternoon’s events. Volunteer Iowa
court reporters were involved in reporting
the individual live veteran histories, and
volunteer videographers provided video
documentation of the interviews. The
transcripts and the video records of each
interview will be archived in the U.S. Library of Congress.
Veterans Day Arrives
A
t the opening ceremony, U.S.
Congressman Leonard Boswell,
representing Iowa’s Third Congressional District, who was a
Lieutenant Colonel in the Army
and a Vietnam War Veteran, welcomed
the veterans and urged them to tell their
stories so they could be recorded. Many
photographs were taken throughout the
day.
Following the opening ceremony, veterans, interviewers, court reporters, and
videographers proceeded to individual
rooms to record the histories. Many veter-
46
ans shared service-related memorabilia to
be included with the histories.
At the closing ceremony, at Bob Holliday, attorney at law, who is president of
the Gold Star Museum at Camp Dodge,
Iowa, updated the audience on the new
additions at the museum. He requested
that copies of the transcribed histories
from this AIB event also be submitted
for archiving there. Then Sergeant Major
Doyle Norris, command sergeant major
of the Iowa National Guard and a highly
decorated veteran, presented certificates
to each veteran in thanks for their participation and expressed his thanks to the
veterans and their families for the sacrifices they’ve made for our country.
Why It’s Important
Many smiles and positive comments
decorated this entire event.
Wanda L., McInerney, freelance court
reporter from Carroll, Iowa, who reported
a veteran’s story at AIB, wrote: “This was
very personal to me as I am the widow of
Lieutenant Colonel Bernard McInerney,
who served in the Army for 21-½ years.
It was such a pleasure, while standing outside of the building, watching and listening to the honorees leaving the building
and hearing them say, overwhelmingly,
‘Wow! What a day!’”
Freelance reporter and videographer,
Wes Nygren, and his wife, Nancy, wrote:
“Nancy and I both felt it was an honor
and a pleasure to meet and videotape the
husband/wife veterans, and they each told
of their experiences serving in the military
during World War II. It is good to know
that their sharing of their memories of
service to our country is documented and
preserved at the Library of Congress for future generations to read, view, and hear.”
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Dave Furneaux, project coordinator
of the Veterans Administration Central
Health Care System in Des Moines, who
was an interviewer for this VHP, wrote:
“AIB’s initiative gave the Veterans History
Project a visibility and momentum we can
all use in Central Iowa now. People are
aware of it and ‘get it.’”
Videographer Michael Gruich of Lamoni, Iowa, wrote: “Your group did a great
job. I was happy to be a small part of it.
Every one of those people were smiling
and certainly felt more respect than they
had in a quite a while. It was really nice to
meet everyone, as I also was treated quite
well. Please feel free to request my services
for the next program.”
Dave Munoz, videographer for Munoz
Productions, Inc., wrote: “Thanks to you
and your team for organizing the Veterans
History event. Being in the video business,
we are behind the scenes at quite a few
events, and we appreciate what a tremendous amount of teamwork it takes to handle the logistics as well as AIB did. From
preparatory communication through execution, it was excellent. Munoz Productions is honored to have participated in
it.”
The VHP Committee plans another
campus event next year on Veterans Day
at AIB. It is the committee’s hope that
by spreading this important news, many
campuses across the state will host similar
events. There is a waiting list compiled at
AIB for those veterans who were not able
to come to the Veterans Day event this
year, due to illness or other intervening
causes, who would like to give their histories, including those with disabilities in
nursing homes and veterans homes. It is
hoped that individual court reporters and
videographers will conduct their own outreach VHP interviews for archiving at the
Library of Congress for this vital program.
Reporters Wanda McInerney, Karin Huff,
Robin Qualy, and Jill Hinders.
Additionally, more than 800 video interviews are on file at the Grout Museum
District in Waterloo, Iowa, awaiting transcription.
The heartfelt thanks of AIB College
and the Iowa Court Reporters Association are extended to those volunteer court
reporters, videographers, AIB administration, faculty, staff, and students who
helped make this event possible.
Veteran Dean Lloyd and his wife, Evelyn, say it best: “Your generosity is beyond
a simple thank-you. The entire day was so
special to all of us.” n
Want to Participate?
Be a Part of
“2,010 by Memorial Day 2010”
NCRF is are proud of
the wonderful work that
NCRA members have
NCRF done for the Veterans HisNational
tory Project and are chalCourt Reporters
lenging you with a brand
Foundation
new initiative: “2,010 by
Memorial Day 2010.”
NCRF has already submitted more
than 1,900 VHP transcriptions to the
Library of Congress, and we have a goal
to make that total 2,010 by Memorial
Day 2010!
Every day we lose many of our aging war veterans — and their incredible stories are silenced forever. Help
us preserve their personal oral histories
before it’s too late.
Please help NCRF meet its goal,
and earn CEUs while doing it! Contact Beth Kilker, NCRF’s Oral Histories Program Coordinator, at 800-2726272, ext. 174, or [email protected],
for more information.
Pam and Bob Day, cochairs of the AIB Veterans Day Project.
Tips & Hints for Putting on a VHP Day
O
n Veterans Day 2009, Iowa court reporters and students and staff members from
AIB College of Business brought United States Veterans’ onto the campus to
tell their stories for our national Veterans History Project. The VHP honors
the service of U.S. military members by collecting their personal stories and
memorabilia.
To help gather stories for the project, AIB hosted its first VHP day and invited local court reporters, videographers, and veterans to participate. What follows is a brief
interview with Jane Weingart, who was involved in coordinating the volunteer efforts.
The United States Congress created the Veterans History Project in 2000. The authorizing legislation (Public Law 106-380), sponsored by Representatives Ron Kind,
Amo Houghton, and Steny Hoyer in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senators
Max Cleland and Chuck Hagel in the U.S. Senate, received unanimous support and was
signed into law by President William Jefferson Clinton on October 27, 2000. The stories
are collected by the Library of Congress. Some of the stories that have been transcribed
are available on the VHP Web site at www.loc.gov/vets/. The National Court Reporters
Foundation has partnered with the Library of Congress since 2003 on this project, and
so far reporters have transcribed 1,900 histories through this program.
How many years has the school put together a VHP day?
Veterans Day 2009 was the first one at AIB. However, AIB plans to host one VHP
on campus every year. Our inspiration was Dave Wynne of Stenograph who shared this
story with the School Administrators Community of Interest Group at the NCRA Convention. Sherry Hill of Prince Institute was so helpful to us at AIB. Prince Institute has
hosted several veteran events, as has Denver College of Court Reporting.
How can court reporters, students, and members of the local
community get involved? How do you find veterans to take part?
The students were hosts at this event, although they could also be interviewers. Our
faculty volunteers from AIB were interviewers and also hosts. On the AIB college side,
we had president Nancy Williams; Kay Smith, department chair of realtime reporting
and professor; Mary Ann Nielsen, senior director of community relations; José de Jesus,
director of communications; and Kris Mattoon, office administrator.
Retired court reporters Bob and Pam Day served as our co-chairs and dealt directly
with the individual veterans throughout the project. I was acting in several roles as a
representative of the Iowa Court Reporters Association, as a backup volunteer court
reporter, and as AIB Board of Trustees chairperson.
We had 24 volunteer certified court reporters from around the state, as well as 23
volunteer videographers who reported and recorded the interviews and the opening and
closing ceremonies.
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47
Court reporter, Kelli Mulcahy,
Veteran Calvin Wright,
Lyynn Clark, AIB Instructor
Interviewer.
Court reporters Laura McFall, and Cindy
Miller, AIB ost, Sarah Doty, and court reporter
Suzanne Shogard.
To help get interest in the event, we had an article in the Des Moines Register,
and then several small newspapers around the state picked up the story and ran
it. We asked for veterans to call the college, and then Bob and Pam would contact
the veterans. Several veterans groups also then contacted the college, so with
basically one story, we were able to get more than 30 veterans signed up. Those
who couldn’t attend are on the waiting list for the 2010 VHP on Veterans Day. (If
we hadn’t had an adequate response to the story, our plan was to contact veteran
groups and veteran hospital administration locally.)
How do you get media coverage for this?
Our AIB communications director, José, contacted the Des Moines Register,
and they ran the press release, with pictures, about October 1. We gave them
basic information and background on the college and the Iowa Court Reporters
Association.
About how long did it take to put together this event? Is there
any advice you would give another organization trying to put
together such an event?
We started in late August for the Nov. 11 event. Sherry and Dave suggested
three or four months would be better. The advice I would give is the same advice we received from Sherry at Prince: Have the same person/people be in communication with the veterans from the beginning until the end of the project.
Consistency is vital in working with the veterans and their families. A committee
should be formed to plan and oversee the VHP from beginning to end. We would
love to have simultaneous nationwide VHPs on Veterans Day at many colleges
throughout the country — including all court reporting schools! This is our goal:
to spread the message among as many colleges as we can — both private and
public — to get the histories recorded!
What are the benefits to having a VHP day at the school?
Everyone has a great time being together. From the court reporters’ side, it is
much easier to report the history live than to later transcribe the interview — it
is much better and easier for the reporters. To sum up our experience, everyone
involved was smiling throughout the day and said, let’s do this again! What a
rewarding event.
Are there any challenges that are good to know about
beforehand?
Have backup lists of veterans, court reporters, videographers, and other volunteers. We had two extra court reporters present as well as two extra videographers
with equipment in case of last-minute emergencies, such as people who ended up
getting sick. n
48
Dear President Williams:
I wanted to thank you and
your staff for the Veterans’ Day
History Project conducted on
AIB campus this last Veterans
Day.
You and your staff made
me, or I should say, all of the
veterans feel very comfortable.
I was quite nervous at first, but
every one of the staff assigned
to me made me feel less
nervous; and had it not been for
my hostess, Kelly McGarvie, I
might have left, but she stayed
with me, kind of holding my
hand, and helped me through.
In fact, I felt quite special.
Every one of the staff did a
marvelous job, and you should
be proud of them. I consider
this project very important, as
did all the veterans.
Thank you for letting me
tell my story, and please thank
everyone for a job ‘WELL DONE.’
Signed
John Vandehaar, Veteran
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
NCRA refuted a
white paper by the
association of court
administrators
that recommends a
reckless approach
to making the court
record, which
will endanger the
integrity of the
legal system.
50
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NCRA DEFENds
OFFICIALS AGAINST PAPER
Recommending ER
I
n December 2009, the Conference of State Court Administrators (COSCA) adopted the white paper “Digital Recording: Changing Times for Making the Record,” a paper that recommends that court systems use
digital audio recording as their main means of keeping
a court record. In response, NCRA President SueLynn Morgan,
RPR, criticized COSCA both for the process it used in the development of the white paper and for the factual errors that riddle
the report. (To view the COSCA paper, visit http://cosca.ncsc.
dni.us/WhitePapers/DigitalRecording-Jan-2010.pdf. Morgan’s letter
is published on page 52.)
Veil of Secrecy
The first issue to confront in viewing the COSCA paper is
not the paper itself, but that COSCA neglected to not only involve stenographic court reporters in their discussions, but also
“other groups representing judges, jurists, attorneys, parties, or
the public in their process, groups whose perspectives and knowledge as the primary users of the court record must be part of
any serious discussion on the topic.” Just a year ago, COSCA
adopted its “White Paper on Promoting a Culture of Accountability and Transparency.” Yet, despite overtures made by NCRA
to ­COSCA on many levels, neither NCRA in an official capacity
nor any stenographic reporter was permitted to present information or answer questions on the making of the record.
Errors of Fact
Court systems — like all governmental institutions — are under serious pressures to cut expenses in the current economic
environment, but making wholesale changes to the method with
which courts create and preserve the legal record on the basis of
short-term savings, without serious consideration of the impact
such changes would have on the integrity of the judicial system,
is reckless.
“Our concern is that in an economic environment where even
the appearance of savings will get the attention of court officials
and legislators, people will overlook the fact that COSCA’s paper
does nothing to quantify the alleged savings that courts would
realize in migrating to digital audio recording,” said NCRA executive director and CEO, Mark Golden, CAE. “Substantially
worse, however, is that COSCA’s paper recommends such fundamental changes to the judicial system with no corroborating
evidence of any variety — either quantitative or qualitative in
nature — to support the conclusion that using digital audio in
courtrooms will not result in a degradation of quality in making
the court record.”
For decades, stenographic reporters have had to contend with
the challenges of audio recording in the courtroom and all too
often have found that courts can make important decisions that
compromise the integrity of the judicial process based on misinformation about the capabilities of audio recording and its unsubstantiated potential for cost savings. Even though the ­COSCA
white paper neglects to use any data or evidence to support its
contention that digital audio can save courts money, NCRA
fears that it nonetheless could be used to justify such changes.
NCRA also finds it irresponsible for the COSCA white paper to completely ignore the fact that it was stenographic court
­reporters who introduced technology to the courtroom. Beginning with computer-aided transcription more than two decades
ago and followed by realtime reporting systems that allow full and
instantaneous access to court proceedings for those with hearingrelated disabilities, court reporters have been pioneers in using
technology to make the record more useful to courthouse staff
and participants in the justice system.
Indeed, despite the fact that COSCA suggests throughout the
paper that digital audio is an acceptable method for creating the
court record, on a number of occasions it indicates that in cases
involving capital crimes or in complex civil cases, a ­realtime,
stenographic reporter should be used. In acknowledging the
superiority of stenographic reporters in these types of cases,
COSCA undermines its own conclusion that audio recording is
generally acceptable for all court proceedings by acknowledging
that it is not the appropriate choice for the most important or
complex cases.
Within its white paper, COSCA references as a resource a
study by the Judicial Management Institute that was funded by
the National Court Reporters Foundation titled “How to Conduct an Assessment of Your Court’s Record-Making Operations.” NCRA finds it perplexing that COSCA would feel the
need to construct a paper that so one-sidedly recommends courts
move to digital audio recording while acknowledging a resource
courts have at their disposal to assess their needs for making the
official record, analyze costs of various methods, and then draw
their own conclusions. n
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NCRA Responds to Report Recommending Recording
25 January 2010
Steven C. Hollon, President
Conference of State Court Administrators
Dear Mr. Hollon:
The National Court Reporters Association has had
the opportunity to review the recent white paper issued by
­COSCA entitled “Digital Recording: Changing Times for
Making the Record.” It was curious to NCRA that the committee COSCA charged to construct its paper neglected to
include our organization or indeed any court reporters in the
process it used to come to its conclusions. As professionals
who are quite literally involved on a daily basis with creating
the court record, we do not see the logic in neglecting to consider the perspectives of such a relevant group in at least the
intelligence-gathering process for such a paper. Over the past
several months, NCRA has continually requested an opportunity to provide input into the task force’s research and was
refused at every step. We do not claim to have a monopoly on
all wisdom related to making the court record, but it simply is
inconceivable that COSCA would consider our experiences,
data, research, and perspectives to be entirely irrelevant in an
intellectually honest discussion of a subject on which court
reporters indisputably are subject matter experts.
Equally troubling is that COSCA did not appear to involve other groups representing judges, jurists, attorneys, parties, or the public in their process, groups whose perspectives
and knowledge as the primary users of the court record must
be part of any serious discussion on this topic. Moreover, the
closed process employed in developing this white paper is entirely inconsistent with the principles espoused in COSCA’s
own “White Paper on Promoting a Culture of Accountability
and Transparency,” adopted by your organization just a year
ago.
Such an opaque, insular, and exclusive process predictably
led to seriously flawed conclusions. Even more serious than
the shortcomings of the conclusions of the paper itself is the
complete absence of empirical data or any sort of corroborating evidence to support those conclusions. Statements of
opinion are given an illusion of factual basis through liberal
use of citations to studies commissioned by other organizations – including by NCRA and the National Court Reporters
Foundation – where the specific findings of those studies do
nothing to support the paper’s stated theses.
The paper and its conclusions grossly oversimplify or entirely ignore the practical limitations of the “audio only” record that it recommends serve as the de facto official record
of all proceedings. The costs (in real dollars as well as time)
incurred by the parties and superior courts, if there is cause
for another court or panel to review a lower court’s actions,
are ignored. Issues of ensuring the privacy and security of confidential information within audio records are entirely unaddressed.
52
SERVING THE REPORTING
AND CAPTIONING
PROFESSIONS
NCRA recognizes that audio and video recording have
made their way into the judicial process. In fact, it was the
National Court Reporters Foundation that funded a study by
the Judicial Management Institute that you cite in your paper,
which provides courts with assessment tools for evaluating
its record-making needs in an objective and practical manner. We recognize that in the current economic environment
court administrators face strong pressures to reduce their
budgets and it is not their intention to reduce the quality and
integrity of the record in that effort. We likewise acknowledge that there are competing demands on all members of the
judicial system and numerous conflicting perspectives over
the best solutions. We are prepared to present and defend
our own perspectives in a constructive and open fashion. It
is the entirely one-sided nature of the COSCA white paper
to which we object and that does an injustice to those courts
honestly struggling with these serious matters.
It is our position that court administrators would be wise to
disregard the conclusions of the COSCA paper, not because
it treats the profession of stenographic reporting in an unfair
and negative light — though it most assuredly does — but
because the conclusions misrepresent the realities that court
administrators, parties, jurists, and the Bar face in seeking an
effective administration of justice.
We recognize that we are taking a strong stance in our
­response, but we feel this situation rises to a level of importance that we must leave no ambiguity in our position. We
likewise recognize that court administrators possess a unique
perspective that is highly relevant to any discussion of how the
court record is created and maintained. It, therefore, was particularly alarming that an organization that represents court
administrators would fail not only to include stenographic
court reporters in its discussions, but also other groups from
the legal arena — such as judges, attorneys, parties, and the
public — whose collective knowledge, experience, and expertise should have been foundational elements of conclusions
drawn or recommendations made regarding the future of the
court record.
Should COSCA be willing to reengage in a true and fair
analysis of the needs of courts with regard to making the record, we are prepared to be fully supportive of, and an active
participant in, that process.
Sincerely,
SueLynn Morgan, RPR
NCRA President
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By Mary Anne Cas sel Meyer
When it comes to making things better, we can respond as
a group — but we can also respond on an individual basis
each day. Here are one reporter’s thoughts.
A
re you following the problems official court
reporters are having in these difficult economic times? Here are three areas where
court reporters might be able to alleviate
some of the concerns of court administration. These are all areas mentioned in reports made
to courts around the country — reports we should
all be reading too, so that we are aware of what the
public perception is and so that we can find out
about and do our best to fix whatever problems we
have out there.
Timely transcript delivery
Turning around transcripts in a timely fashion
is one of the strengths of the competent reporter.
However, there are proponents of digital recording who are making claims about court reporters’
transcript delivery times which, if true, would raise
understandable concerns. But we as reporters also
face the difficulty of having to refute these claims
in the absence of firm numbers — and when those
JCR Contributing Editor Mary Anne Cassel Meyer, RDR, is
an official court reporter from Vermillion, S.D.
numbers can be proved wrong, it is incumbent upon
reporters to challenge the numbers as such. One
example of these unsupported claims is when, on
January 25, 2010, Utah Supreme Court Chief Justice Christine Durham told her legislature that a
switch to digital audio recording reduced the number of days it took to produce a transcript “from 138
days to 16.”1 NCRA has refuted this claim (see page
13), but to a certain extent, the damage is already
done. We must remain vigilant and work together
to prevent such information from being perceived
as accurate.
If an official finds himself or herself facing an
unexpectedly large backlog — all it takes is for two
long trials reported several weeks ago to be appealed
at roughly the same time — there are a few things
an official can do to prevent having to ask for an
extension or to limit the length of extension needed.
The official can hire a scopist and/or a proofreader.
A reporter can ask to share the load, even in a court
system where reporters are not pooled, perhaps
splitting longer trials among two or three reporters. In courts where each reporter is assigned to a
specific judge, it may go against the grain to switch
reporters, especially if it means a reporter has to give
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55
up exciting trial work to others, but the
first concern should be efficient service to
the bench, the bar, and the public. Ownership of the
official record
There are concerns about being able
to obtain transcripts several years after
the proceedings took place. Some court
reporters view their steno notes as their
work product and not as court property,2
and in some places, “the raw record (either stenotype notes or the audiotape
made by a voice writer) … is often held in
the possession of the court reporter rather
than by the court clerk.”3 But when the
court system does not retain possession
of the untranscribed record, some courts
have had problems involving “difficulty in
locating reporters and/or notes for postconviction proceedings; ownership and
safe storage of notes; …[and] absconding
court reporters….”4
Some states require that the notes be
filed, but not the CAT dictionaries, which
some reporters are reluctant to provide.
As one study promoting ER pointed out,
“Even when the court has custody of
the notes, …[i]t is almost impossible for
a reporter without access to the personal dictionary of the original reporter to
completely and accurately transcribe the
notes. This causes access and timeliness
problems when court reporters are on vacation, or ill, move out of the jurisdiction,
or are otherwise unavailable.”5 Problems
like these can lead court administration to
look for other ways to preserve the record.
This problem could be solved if court
reporters would be willing to leave their
notes and a copy of their dictionary with
the court clerk, or on an external drive
that is kept in their office if the clerk is not
set up to file these records. Court reporters
have a duty to preserve the untranscribed
record in a fashion that ensures that it can
be easily accessed years down the road.
They need a reliable backup and filing
system. They should also arrange for another reporter or a scopist who could transcribe for them in the event of their death
or incapacitation, providing that person
with necessary passwords, dictionaries,
and information about their backup and
filing systems and CAT software. Court
reporters who choose to become officials
should also accept the fact that even after they change jobs or retire, they may be
called upon to transcribe something they
reported in the past. Reporters who do not
accept this responsibility put the reliability
of court reporters everywhere in question.
The perception that
court reporters are
paid too much
Reports differ as to whether installing
digital recording equipment actually results in cost savings to court administration. However, in these hard economic
times, when almost all state governments
are in bad financial shape, it is easy to
point a finger at court reporters and say,
“Look, they not only get a salary and benefits, but they also get to charge extra for
making the transcript.” Of particular concern are court reporters who ask their employers to hire substitute reporters so that
the official can work on transcripts during
court time. In a 2006 report from Pierce
County, Wash., it was noted that
Court practice appears to allow a staff court
reporter to prepare transcripts on county time
while the court hires pro tem court reporters. …
This means the taxpayer is paying three times.
The payments are for:
1.The court reporter’s salary while she/he is
doing private work,
2. T
he pro tem court reporter’s fee while she/
he is assisting a pro tem judge or, more often,
a regular judge, and
3. T
he transcript fee, which in criminal appeals is paid out of public funding at the
rate of $2.80 per page.6
Even the Conference of State Court
Administrators begins their report on
REFERENCES
digital recording by asking, “What reason
would we provide for the fact many employees receive a fee beyond their government salary from litigants requiring transcription for appeal purposes?” 7
Court reporters provide their own supplies, equipment, and computer software,
pay for their own insurance, maintenance
agreements, updates, and repairs, and
they are expected to produce their transcripts after hours, which would surely be
considered a legitimate “reason to provide
for the fact” that they “receive a fee beyond their government salary.” But if you
have a situation where a court is paying
both the official reporter and a pro tem reporter for the same hours, it is easy to see
why court administrators might want to
look at other options.
It is absolutely vital that officials do
their best to cover for one another in order to avoid the expense of hiring pro tem
reporters, and also that officials do their
best to deliver transcripts in a timely manner. Don’t be afraid to ask for help from
a fellow official. Don’t hesitate to offer
help to a reporter you know may be facing difficulties. Don’t hesitate to suggest
the names of reliable scopists; and consider hiring a scopist if you happen to have
backlog problems.
Choose any profession at all, and you
will find a small group of people in it who
let that profession and the public down,
and who make things difficult for the majority of people who are working hard to
do their job right. Yes, I find complaints
on line about electronic recording devices
as well. But I’m not addressing machines
in this article. I am addressing all court
reporters, regardless of their reporting
method. We are all in this together. We
should all be working together to provide
the bench and bar with the best service
possible. n
1. Utah State Courts. “2010 State of the Judiciary Address.” January 25, 2010. http://www.utcourts.gov/resources/reports/statejudiciary/2010StateOfTheJudiciary.pdf. pg. 2
2. Minnesota Supreme Court. “Recommendations of the Minnesota Supreme Court Advisory Committee on Rules of Public Access to Records of the Judicial Branch:
Final Report.” September 11, 2007. http://www.legaltechcenter.net/_layouts/searchresults.aspx?k=advisory%20committee&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.
legaltechcenter.net. Page 9. See also http://www.lawlibrary.state.mn.us/access/accessreport.htm at endnote 82.
3. Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. “Report of the Study Committee on Trial Transcripts.” June 30, 2003. http://www.mass.gov/courts/trialtransrep.
pdf. Page 26.
4. Maryland Court of Appeals. “Report of the Ad Hoc Court Reporters’ Committee.” September 9, 2009. http://www.courts.state.md.us/publications/
ctreporters03.pdf. Page 1.
5. COSCA (Conference of State Court Administrators). “Digital Recording: Changing Times for Making the Record.” Adopted December 2009. http://
cosca.ncsc.dni.us/WhitePapers/DigitalRecording-Jan-2010.pdf. Page 4.
6. Temmel, Matt. “Planning Study: Court Reporter Issues.” November 2, 2006. Pierce County (Washington) Superior Court. http://74.125.95.132/
search?q=cache:3yDIFWdVZusJ:www.co.pierce.wa.us/xml/abtus/ourorg/communications/Report%2520on%2520Court%2520Reporters%2520
Nov%25202006.pdf+pierce+county+court+reporters&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us. Page 16.
7. COSCA. Page 1.
56
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BRIEFS
Q & A
We need to work together to ensure that HLAA
Accessibility Advocate
[members] understand the current trends in the
By Deanna P. Baker
CART and captioning industry that NCRA can pro-
had the chance to ask a few questions of Lise Hamlin, the
Director of Public Policy & State Development for Hearing
Loss Association of America. I thought her perspectives on
captioning advocacy would be enlightening for captioners
and all court reporters and allied professions.
Q. Can you explain what the Coalition of Organizations for
Accessible Technology, COAT, is, and how HLAA is involved?
A. COAT, the Coalition of Organizations for Accessible Technology is a coalition of more than 260 national, regional, state,
and community-based disability organizations. COAT advocates
for legislative and regulatory safeguards that will ensure full access
by people with disabilities to evolving high speed broadband, wireless and other Internet Protocol (IP) technologies.
HLAA is represented on COAT both on the national level and
on the local level: nationally, we attend and support COAT activities; also, many of our state and chapter affiliates have joined
COAT as local members.
Q. Is HLAA involved with NCRA? If so, in what capacity?
A. We work with NCRA on several coalitions, notably COAT
and the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Alliance (DHHA). Because
we work closely on legislation that is important to both NCRA
and HLAA, we share both information and support. HLAA has
also brought out our grassroots to write letters to support NCRA
efforts.
Q. Why do you think it’s important that HLAA be involved
with court reporters?
A. Because CART writers and captioners provide the kind of
access to information and services people with significant hearing
loss need. We need to work together to ensure that HLAA [members] understand the current trends in the CART and captioning
industry that NCRA can provide. And HLAA members can give
NCRA members the perspective that comes from being the end
user of their services, as well as provide grassroots support on issues.
Q. Have HLAA members benefited from working with the
National Court Reporters Association? If so, how?
A. Yes. NCRA has been there for us by supporting issues coming before DHHA over the years and more recently with COAT.
Often NCRA members have directly supported our efforts locally
and nationally. I know of several cases where NCRA members
have provided CART pro bono to local chapter members, as well
as providing us information about CART and captioning locally.
Nationally, NCRA has provided a perspective to HLAA on national CART and captioning trends.
Q. What involvement does HLAA have with legislation that
may involve court reporters?
A. HLAA has supported federal legislation that provides federal grant money to schools providing training for CART writers,
as well as COAT, which we hope will open up the Internet as
another avenue for caption writers.
vide. And HLAA members can give NCRA members
I
the perspective that comes from being the end
user of their services, as well as provide grassroots
support on issues.
Q. How could NCRA members help with legislative actions
that involve HLAA?
A. NCRA members could help us by keeping informed about
the legislative issues impacting HLAA members by joining HLAA.
They can also visit our Web page at www.hearingloss.org and sign
up for our eNews that provides up-to-date information about legislative issues. And they could get actively involved with COAT
legislation by writing their Congressmen requesting they support
the bill and come on as cosponsors.
Q. What else would you like NCRA members to know about
HLAA’s work with COAT?
A. HLAA is working with COAT because many of the provisions of the proposed law cover access to the Internet, including
captioning for the Internet and Internet-capable devices. From
the COAT Web site:
Many federal laws have been enacted to require greater access to telecommunications. There is only one problem — the federal laws that we worked so
hard to enact over the past 20 years have not kept pace with many new technologies. For instance, television shows that are reshown over the Internet are
under no requirement to be captioned — even if they had captions when they
were shown on TV! Also, small TVs, cell phones, PDAs, and other mobile
devices are not required to display captions, even though they are now capable
of showing TV shows. Also, for now, 911 emergency call centers cannot accept
calls from people who need to communicate in video or via pagers.
Q. What would you like to see from NCRA members and
their involvement with HLAA?
A. I would love to see more NCRA members become HLAA
members, work with us on COAT and other legislation and issues, become involved with local chapters to meet the people in
their own community that they serve. NCRA members could also
provide us feedback on the ways we can work together on issues
they see as important.
JCR Contributing Editor Deanna P. Baker, RMR, is willing to answer
your questions about captioning. You can e-mail her at dpbaker@
mindspring.com.
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BRIEFS
M E D I A
W A T C H
The Media Watch column provides summaries of articles and general information,
but publication here should not be considered
an endorsement or verification of the information. The purpose of this column is to give
members a sampling of what is published
about court reporting and associated professions.
Court Reporting Mentioned
Among Hottest Jobs
In the January 10 California Job Journal,
court reporting and captioning were mentioned as one of the hottest jobs in 2010.
The article mentions court reporting as
one of a number of two-year degrees with
good potential, noting that the two-year
degree should be an area of growth in the
current economy.
The article was available at http://www.
jobjournal.com/thisweek.asp?artid=2862.
Trial Lawyers President Relies on Court Reporters
A January 24 article on Boston.com
quoted Joan Lukey, the president of the
American College of Trial Lawyers, on
the shrinking budgets in Massachusetts
courts. She said, “When money for translators and court reporters was cut, that
meant there weren’t enough court reporters to cover all the trials. I for one don’t
feel comfortable relying on a tape recording. And people who can’t speak English,
or who speak it minimally, are thrust into a
courtroom, which can be frightening even
for someone who does speak English. Is it
going to take some terrible tragedy before
we realize how important the judiciary
budget is?”
The article was available at http://www.
boston.com/business/articles/2010/01/24/
budgets_shrinking_state_courts_need_
boost/.
Handheld Captioning in NFL’s
Cowboys Stadium
On January 13, SOA World Magazine
reported that the NFL’s Cowboys Stadium
offered a new system to provide closed
captioning to attendees. The new assistive
service is a handheld unit, which was made
ethics
Holding Transcripts Hostage
By Michael R. Brentano
E
veryone likes to be paid in a
timely manner for the transcripts
that they produce, and they certainly expect to get paid promptly
by another reporting firm from
whom they take referrals. So what happens when you produce the work, send
the ASCII file off, mail the signed certificate pages with exhibits, and then never
get paid? And let’s say this isn’t the first
time it’s happened. Let’s say you have a
mounting stack of past due invoices for
this company and they’re just ignoring
your requests for payment.
What are your options? Is it appropriate or ethical to hold up delivery of a
transcript because you are owed money
by a reporting agency for prior transcripts
in the current or other cases? In other
words, can you hold a transcript “hostage” in order to be paid for your work?
The short answer is no, it is neither
appropriate nor is it ethical to refuse to
deliver a transcript because of outstanding invoices. Each reporter and reporting agency has an ethical obligation to
produce the transcript for the parties
involved in the litigation in a timely
manner so that they don’t jeopardize any
pending actions in court. These actions
58
Is it appropriate or ethical to
are in violation of Provision 1, which requires the court reporter to be “fair …
toward each participant in all aspects of
reported proceedings.” In addition, they
run afoul of Provision 9, which requires
the court reporter to maintain the integrity of the court reporting profession.
So what options does an ethical firm
owner or freelance reporter have under
this set of circumstances?
First of all, to borrow a tried and true
cliché, “The squeaky wheel gets the
grease.” Send out monthly statements
showing all paid and outstanding invoices. This is a good business practice to alert
the “problem” agency that you are aware
of their debt to you and that you expect
to be paid promptly. Circle the past due
amounts and include a handwritten note
requesting immediate payment. This is
more effective than a past due stamp or
computer-generated message. You should
also follow up with a phone call to directly ask when you can expect payment.
The key to getting paid is regular contact.
What if an agency, be it local or out
of state, calls you again to cover work for
them in your area? While you should not
hold a transcript hostage, you can certainly let them know that you will only
produce work for them on a COD basis.
In the alternative, you can insist on being
given a credit card number that you can
keep on file to assure payment by them
for any future work. This gives them fair
and ample notice that you expect them
hold up delivery of a transcript
because you are owed money
by a reporting agency for prior transcripts in the current or
other cases?
to pay promptly for the work you perform
for them.
Finally — while many reporters want
to take as much work as possible — you
can always turn down a job from a client
who doesn’t pay. That way you are available should a good paying client want to
schedule with you.
Michael J. Brentano is a member of the Committee on Professional Ethics and a past president of NCRA. Business and ethics questions
can be directed to Mona Savino, staff liaison
to COPE, at [email protected]. More information on NCRA’s Code of Ethics can be
found on the NCRA Web site (www.NCRAonline.org).
The information in this article reflects the status of the law in most jurisdictions. Members
are required to conform to the accepted practices set forth in this Public Advisory Opinion
to the extent that such practices are consistent with their own applicable state and local
laws, rules, and regulations.
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BRIEFS
available for guests who are deaf, hearing
impaired, blind, or low vision-impaired.
A captioner is present to the stadium to
send realtime of in-house commentary to
the handheld units. Guests could access
closed captioning and assistive audio in
their seats and throughout the building.
The article was available at http://
in.sys-con.com/node/1245534.
Maryland Considers Law to
Require Captioning in Bars
A January 21 article in the Frederick
(Md.) News Post noted that the Maryland
legislature is considering a bill to require
closed captioning be turned on in public
restaurants with televisions. The request
came from the Maryland Office of the
Deaf and Hard of Hearing. However, the
Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee
was cautious. They cited concerns that
captions would block too much of the
screen during sports events as a consideration.
This article was available at http://
www.fredericknewspost.com/sections/
news/reporters_notebooks_display.
htm?StoryID=100375.
L E G A L
plan to raise rates in 2010. The average
rate increase was 3.2 percent.”
The article was available at
http://www.law.com/jsp/article.
jsp?id=1202438334088&src=EMCEmail&et=editorial&bu=Law.
com&pt=LAWCOM%20Newswire&cn=N
W_20100115&kw=Despite%20Down%20
Economy%2C%20Law%20Firms%20
Say%20They’ll%20Raise%20Billing%20
Rates.
Outsourcing Still an Issue
for Law Firms
Following a January 15 Times of London article, “Brief for India’s outsourcing
lawyers: keep it cheap,” law blogs were
discussing the issues. The article included
quotes from young lawyers in India and
London about finding work and about the
trend of outsourcing legal work from London to Mumbai. The article was available
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/
at
business/industry_sectors/support_services/
article6988773.ece.
The Benefits of PACER
R E V I E W
Law Firms Say They’ll Raise
Billing Rates
The January 10 Fulton County [Ga.]
Daily Report published an article based on
the results of an Altman Weil survey of
lawyers. According to the survey, “About
90 percent of the firms that responded
The January 29 New Jersey Law Journal
published an article by John R. Tunheim,
Chair of the Judicial Conference’s Court
Administration and Case Management
Committee. In the article, Judge Tunheim
expounded the benefits of PACER as an alternative system to using paper transcripts.
The article was available at http://www.
law.com/jsp/lawtechnologynews/PubArticleLTN.jsp?id=1202439613210&PACER_
Picking_Up_the_Pace.
get more news
A
re you interested in staying up with the latest in court reporting news?
NCRA tracks news about the court reporting and captioning professions. If
you want to know the latest headlines, here are ways you can find out what
is being said about your colleagues:
• Make sure we have your current e-mail address so we can send you NCRA’s
News Flash and Tech Tracker. Both e-newsletters include links to articles we think
you should know about.
• Follow NCRA on Twitter.com. This is the place to find out the most recent
links about the profession and NCRA events.
• Keep track of news on NCRA’s Online Forum. NCRA posts news on the Forum
for you to see and comment on.
Did you see a story we missed? Sent it in to JCR Editor Jacqueline Schmidt at
[email protected].
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
59
Reporting, video or videoconferencing?
We’ll take care of you in a New York minute.
v
FINK & CARNEY
Born and bred New Yorkers
Acculaw1108:Acculaw1108
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62
3:48 P
Address communications about classified
advertising to NCRA, JCR Classifieds, 8224
Old Courthouse Road, Vienna, VA 221823808, Attn: Ashely Frazier; or by e-mail at
[email protected]; or call the NCRA
Member Services and Information Center
— 800-272-6272. Payment must accompany
request for ad space and may be charged to
Visa, MC, Discover, or AmEx. The cost to
members is $2.00 per word, with a $20.00
minimum each time it is published. The cost
to nonmembers is $3.00 per word with a
$30.00 minimum. Ads must be received 60
days prior to month of publication, with no
refunds once they are placed. No ads may be
placed over the phone — hard copy is required. Ads will post online within 5 business days and will remain online until their
appearance in the JCR or until NCRA has
been notified the position is filled. Officialship openings will be placed at no charge
in three consecutive issues unless other arrangement are made. NCRA reserves the
right to accept or reject advertising. NCRA
makes no representations with respect to
prospective employers or employees. NCRA
does not screen, evaluate, or verify positions
available or prospective employees, nor does
it act as intermediary before or after a job is
filled. NCRA assumes no liability for statements made about a job or a job seeker’s
qualifications made in conjunction with
these ads. NCRA will not accept employment advertising that indicates a preference or an intention to make a preference in
terms of race, color, sex, national origin, age,
disability, pregnancy, marital status, religion,
sexual orientation, or political affiliation.
Audiocassettes
Can hypnosis tapes enhance reporting
skills? Absolutely! Order online at www.
mindlight.net, 718-352-5359, e-mail mind
[email protected].
CEUS FOR DICTIONARY BUILDING
EARN CEUs & improve your dictionary
with Dictionary Jumpstart. Informative
Videos and FREE demo CDs at www.
dictionaryjumpstart.com.
Certifications & Training
95 percent success, NCRA written examinations: Pass tests with ease, vastly improve
skills for greater career opportunities, and
accurately build your own dictionary, 420
categories: www.CATapultdix.com. Need a
tutor? Students receive discounts. E-mail:
[email protected].
Washington, D.C. Broadcast captioning
sports training. Stop saying no to broadcast
sports captioning opportunities. Expand
your workload, increase your income, and
improve your overall skills. Affordable remote training available with certified and
experienced captioner/trainer. Comprehen-
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
sive manual included with each sport. Train
on as many or as few sports as you like. Eligible for NCRA CEUs. Contact Steve Clark
at [email protected], 202669-4214.
COURT REPORTING PROGRAM
DIRECTOR
Bryan College, the oldest and most prestigious court reporting college in America, is
looking for an exceptional individual to join
our Los Angeles team as our court reporting program director. If you are looking to
make your mark as an exceptional educator,
feel free to apply. For a detailed job description please submit all résumés and inquiries
to Shanel Oliver, Director of Education, at
[email protected].
REFERENCE BOOKS
Drug Speller 2009 at www.drugspeller.
com. $20 + S&H.
Seminars
Earn CEU credits and
enjoy a cruise too! 2010 cruise/seminars:
June 20, 2010, Alaska 7-day Inside Passage,
Sapphire Princess, Seattle–Seattle; August
22, 2010, 12-day British Isles, Crown
Princess, London–London. Please call 800472-7847 or e-mail: seabelles@fullerandkeir.
Cruisin’ for Credit.®
com.
services
A CTS, Inc. Scoping perfectionist and transcription, 19 years, CATalyst and all software. No reproofing required by reporter.
702-644-1123; [email protected].
Accurate and reliable scopist, Case CAT­
alyst, Premier Power. Quality work. Diane,
760-378-2903; [email protected].
Case CATalyst 9 high-volume scopist, 30
years’ experience in all aspects of law; read
steno fluently; a strong command of the
English language such that transcripts are
returned with the proper punctuation in
place; fast and convenient upload site for
audio files. Excellence and a passion for perfection. [email protected]. 603-3730198.
Case CATalyst Scopist: Former RPR. Proficient in medical. Reliable, professional, accurate. References available. Quick response
to inquires. Judy 972-681-9470, dallasjudy@
tx.rr.com.
Case CATalyst Scopist. Quality work,
competitive rates, quick turnaround. Sarah
[email protected], 406-546-2769.
Case CATalyst Scopist: Proficient and dependable, medical/technical a specialty,
five years’ experience. Pam at 989-8583635 or [email protected]/
www.singularscoping.com.
ProCAT Scopist: Experienced, reliable, proficient. WAV is welcome. Ann Tucker, 303257-2568.
CLASSIFIEDS
Quality Scoping Services, Diane Long, Total Eclipse scopist, T3/FTP, WAV files welcome, 303-699-8930, or dslong3@comcast.
net.
Repair/upgrade/data recovery. Notebooks
with court reporting software. andy@
hdcomp.com, 714-634-1202.
Scoping For You, Cindy Lett. Experienced,
professional, flexible, reliable Eclipse and
Case CATalyst scopist. All types of work
welcome. 208-939-9442 or cindysue86@
msn.com.
Scopist or proofreader: First transcript free!
Case CATalyst 10/Eclipse 4.2.0.6. Certified
English teacher. Law degree. Great rates.
Quick turnaround. References available.
Please contact MayhewEditingServices@
gmail.com or 860-604-5767.
Scopist/Proofreader. Eclipse software. Experienced with ability to handle steady work
or emergency projects. Reasonable rates,
pro­fessional, reliable, references. E-mail
[email protected], or call Kristin at
585-388-5140.
Wanted
Investors wanted. Revolutionary computer
keyboard, market 1.2 trillion worlds
computer users. Business plan available.
[email protected].
I’ll buy your working Fon’iks,
Impact, Impressions writer. Please call 214-821-4138.
Equipment Mart
Computers/software/writers
from all manufactures. Call Acculaw 800251-5529.
A+Acculaw:
Digital Cat (Stenovations) software licenses for sale: Currently renting? Purchas-
ing a license or licenses for $2,000 or best offer. Includes all updates when you purchase
support from Stenovations. art@artmiller.
com or call 800-837-2285.
Eclipse Passport writer: Excellent condition with latest updates. Contact Bob at
215-348-6724 or [email protected].
Eclipse Software: Version 4.3.0.9 for sale.
$3,200. Support paid through December
2010. Contact Kristen Wofford at 850-7664352.
Elan Mira G2: Bluetooth wireless kit, EasyLock T2 tripod, carrying case, battery, AC
adapter/charger, compact Flash Card and
adapter, Mira serial cable adapter, USB cable, USB driver diskette, user guide. Excellent condition. $3,300 or best offer. 517-4029371 or [email protected].
Elan Mira: $2,100. Stentura 8000LX: $1,600.
Each has two chargers, realtime cable,
and soft case. 314-244-7980. garybond@
charter.net.
Lightspeed steno machine: With case,
tripod, manual, realtime cable, and software. Black, previously refurbished but
never used by me. Perfect condition. Paid
$1,800. Will take best offer. 434.242.4360
or 434.295.5861 or [email protected].
Printers: Toshiba, NEC, and lasers for all
CAT systems. 800-251-5529.
ProCAT Winner Software: Version 10.5.0.0
o/b/o. Contact Zaty Zamora at katyzamora@
gmail.com or 505-549-9048.
Stenograph 8000LX: Recent maintenance,
RT cable, case. Extra ribbons, paper no
charge. Wide asterisk and DZ. $1,495 or best
offer. 413-568-0548.
Stenograph: Various writers and software
with warranty. Call Acculaw 800-251-5529.
Stentura: Excellent, used two months. Paid
$1,600, asking $900. 479-876-2324, Margo.
Stentura Fusion: Complete with all manufacturer accessories. Perfect condition.
Used only six months. $3,500 plus shipping.
[email protected].
Stentura 8000: Completely refurbished,
new black housing, new battery, soft case,
realtime cables. $999 plus shipping. 508528-7644 or [email protected].
Stentura 8000: For sale. Excellent condition,
have maintenance records. Realtime cables
and soft-sided case. $1,400 or make offer.
Contact Teri, 608-269-8928 or thocker@
centurytel.net.
Xscribe: Various writers and software with
warranty. Call Acculaw 800-251-5529.
Officialships
The Superior Court of Delaware
in Wilmington and Georgetown is looking for court reporters. Salary $58,320 plus
transcripts income. Must have possession
of a RPR certification as granted by NCRA
or the equivalent thereof. Experience as a
stenographic reporter recording and transcribing verbatim proceedings of judicial or
quasi-judicial hearings, conferences, and
meetings in a court system. Must be realtime
capable within one year of hire. Applicant
must own CAT realtime capable system at
time of hire. Benefits included. Applications
obtained from Superior Court of Delaware,
500 N. King Street, Suite 2850, Wilmington,
DE 19801-3755. For additional information
visit www.courts.delaware.gov/Career%20
Opportunities or call 302-255-0651.
El Dorado, Kansas. Full-time opening in a
three-county district. Pay starts at $37,577
per year, with excellent benefits. Applicants
need to be Kansas CSR or obtain temporary
CSR. Holder of RPR and realtime is preferred. Request applications from Neal Harrison, Court Administrator, 201 West Pine,
El Dorado, KS 67042. 316-322-4358. The
state of Kansas is an EEO/AA employer.
Maryland. The United States District Court
of Maryland is seeking qualified applicants
for the position of full-time official court
reporter. Court reporters are employed en
banc. The incumbent performs court reporting services for all judicial proceedings and
produces transcripts. Qualifications and requirements: Possess a minimum requirement
of at least four years of prime court reporter
experience in the freelance field or in other
Delaware.
courts, or a combination thereof, and have
qualified by testing for listing on the registry of professional reporters of the National
Court Reporters Association (NCRA) or
passed an equivalent qualifying examination. Merit certification and realtime certification preferred. Knowledge of and experience with computer assisted transcription
(CAT). Must provide own CAT system with
realtime capability. Self starter, mature, highly organized; possess tact, good judgment,
poise, initiative; maintain a professional appearance and demeanor at all times. Strong
team orientation and customer service skills.
Communicate effectively, both orally and in
writing. To apply submit résumé, salary history, and cover letter to: Human Resources
Administrator, Attn: Court Reporter vacancy, 4th Floor, U.S. Courthouse, 101 W. Lombard St., Baltimore, MD 21201. EOE.
Mississippi. Full-time opening in the
Fourth Circuit Court District covering
Leflore, Sunflower, and Washington
Counties. Floating position working with
four judges and four court reporters. Must
have Mississippi CSR or obtain temporary
CSR. Realtime preferred. Salary range:
$40,500 to $46,000 plus transcript fees.
Benefits package includes health insurance
and retirement. Equipment and supplies
provided. Send résumés to Honorable Betty
W. Sanders, P.O. Box 244, Greenwood, MS
38935-0244. For additional information, call
662-455-7946.
New York. Vacancy announcement #:1001/CTREPT. Salary: $81,035–$97,242. At
least four years of prime stenographic CAT
court reporting experience in the freelance
field of service or in other courts or a combination thereof; qualified by testing for listing
on the Registry of Professional Reporters of
the National Court Reporters Association
or passed an equivalent qualifying examination that certifies 180 wpm literary, 200
wpm jury charge, and 225 wpm testimony.
The court prefers successful completion of a
CRR examination offered by the NCRA or
an equivalent qualifying examination. Employees of the U.S. District Court are not
included in the Government’s Civil Service
classification. They are, however, entitled to
the same benefits as other federal government employees. Qualified persons please
submit a cover letter, résumé, and an application for Judicial Branch Federal Employment (AO-78 application form is available at http://www.uscourts.gov/; click on
library, then on forms) and a photocopy of
their certificate(s) of proficiency to: Robert
C. Heinemann, Clerk of Court, Attn: Jeffery
Howell, Human Resources Manager, U.S.
District Court, EDNY, 225 Cadman Plaza
East, Brooklyn, NY 11201, Room 123S. Due
to the nature of the position, the successful
candidate must undergo a FBI fingerprint
background check. EOE.
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
63
CLASSIFIEDS
Rapid City, South Dakota. Requisition #:
J10–14. Salary: $17.02–$19.57 per hour.
Open until filled. Position performs stenographic work in recording and transcribing
verbatim court proceedings, hearings and
conferences. Work involves responsibilities
for the verbatim recording and transcription
of testimony in circuit or magistrate court
proceedings, hearings, and conferences.
Transcripts may be certified for judicial appeal and the reporter is responsible for the
absolute accuracy of the transcript. Graduation from high school and an NCRA accredited shorthand reporting school. Experience as a shorthand reporter recording and
transcribing verbatim proceedings of judicial
or quasi-judicial hearings, conferences, and
meetings is preferred. This position is located in the Black Hills area. Preference will be
given to candidates who possess a RPR certification. Successful completion of a criminal background investigation is required for
employment. To apply: submit a letter of
interest and résumé or state employment application (available at a South Dakota Department of Labor office and on the Internet
at www.state.sd.us/jobs) to: PMB 2713-000,
Director of Human Resources, Unified Judicial System, 500 East Capital Ave., Pierre
SD 57501. Phone 605-773-4867; Fax 605773-8437. EOE.
Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Requisition
number: J10–12. Salary: $17–$19 per hour.
Open until filled. Position performs stenographic work in recording and transcribing
verbatim court proceedings, hearings, and
conferences. Work involves responsibility
for the verbatim recording and transcription
of testimony in circuit or magistrate court
proceedings, hearings, and conferences.
Transcripts may be certified for judicial appeal and the reporter is responsible for the
absolute accuracy of the transcript. Graduation from high school and an NCRA accredited school. Experience as a shorthand
reporter recording and transcribing verbatim
proceedings of judicial or quasi-judicial hearings, conference and meetings is preferred.
Successful completion of a criminal background investigation is required for employment. Submit a letter of interest and résumé
or state employment application (available
at a South Dakota Department of Labor office and on the Internet at www.state.sd.us/
jobs) to: PMB 2713-000, Director of Human
Resources, Unified Judicial Systems, 500
East Capitol Ave., Pierre SD 57501. Phone:
605-773-4867; fax: 605-773-8437. EOE.
Tennessee. The United States District
Court, Western District of Tennessee, seeks
a full-time official court reporter in Memphis, Tenn. Requires minimum four years’
prime court reporting experience in the
courts, freelance field, or a combination
thereof, and qualification by testing for listing on the registry of professional reporters
of the NCRA or passed an equivalent quali-
64
fying exam. $72K annually plus full benefits.
Send résumé, cover letter, and completed
application to: [email protected].
gov. Reference Court Reporter position
#09-04. Full posting and employment application available at: http:www.tnwd.uscourt.
gov/employment-opportunities.php http://
www.vawd.uscourts.gov. No phone calls
please. EOE.
Racine, Wisconsin. Applications are being
accepted for a full-time Official Court Reporter in Branch 5, Racine County Circuit
Court. This position is available January 4,
2010. Candidates must have attained RPR
certification or have graduated from an
NCRA-certified court reporting program. Salary is based on qualification level and
previous court reporting experience. Starting salaries range from $37,113 to $62,078
annually, plus transcripts and an excellent
benefits package. To apply please submit a
résumé and cover letter by Friday, October
23, 2009, to Michael Neimon, District Court
Administrator, Racine County Courthouse 7th Floor, 730 Wisconsin Avenue, Racine,
WI 53403-1274 or fax to 262-636-3437 or
e-mail [email protected]. For additional information, contact the District
Court Administrator’s Office at 262-6363133, or visit the Wisconsin Court System’s
Web site at www.wicourts.gov.
Wisconsin. Full- and part-time opportunities available. Salary $35,229–$61,044 plus
transcripts. Excellent benefits. Must be RPR
certified or equivalent, NVRA certified, or a
graduate of an NCRA-approved or NVRAapproved court reporting program. Contact
Andrea Beckes, 608-266-9795, or Chris Willette, WCRA President, at 715-255-4384,
or check the state Web site at wicourts.
gov/about/employment/courtreporter.htm.
Wausau, Wisconsin. Applications are being
accepted for a full-time official court reporter
in branch 3, Marathon County Circuit Court
for Judge Vincent Howard. Candidates must
have attained RPR certification or have
graduated from an NCRA-certified court
reporting program. Realtime proficiency is
required for this position. Salary is based on
qualification level and previous court reporting experience. Starting salaries range from
$37,113 to $62,078 annually, plus transcripts
and an excellent benefits package. To apply
please submit a résumé and cover letter to
Susan Byrnes, District Court Administrator,
2100 Stewart Ave., Suite 310, Wausau, WI
55401 or fax to 751-845-4523 or e-mail to
the District Court Administrator’s Office at
715-842-3872 or visit the Wisconsin Court
System’s Web site at http://www.wicourts.
gov/.
CaptionerS
The Houston Community
College is seeking part-time captionist I and
II. Please apply online at www.hccs.edu and
click on jobs@hcc (lower left bottom of
Houston, Texas.
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
Web page). Access job posting by requisition
# 001960 and 001961 and requirements
and details. CART/ C–Print, part time —
001960. Salary according to education and
experience: captionist I — minimum of one
to three years of directly related experience.
captioinist II — minimum of four plus years
of directly related experience.
FREELANCE
Full and part-time reporters
for busy freelance firm. Concentration of
work in Fairfield County. Excellent income
potential. No seniority system. Great clientele. Send résumé by fax to 203-845-0398,
or call Maria at 203-846-3402.
Connecticut. Need freelance reporters to
cover Stamford, New Haven, and/or Hartford areas. No seniority system. We pay great
rates weekly. Call George 203-485-9731.
New Haven/Hartford, Connecticut. Busy,
expanding firm has immediate openings for
reporters to cover New Haven County and
Hartford County deposition work. Call Maria, 866-351-3404.
Connecticut.
Washington, D.C. / Baltimore / Northern
Virginia. Immediate openings for multiple
RPRs, RMRs, and/or CRRs in an established
firm with an excellent reputation. Work with
prestigious law firms on high-profile cases.
Earn and work as little or as much as you
want. Professional and accommodating office staff. E-mail your résumé to Lisa DiMonte, [email protected].
Washington, D.C. / Baltimore / Northern
Virginia. Work for a woman-owned company
whose motto is: “We are nothing without our
reporters!” We provide great perks — payment every two weeks, mentoring for new reporters. E-mail your résumé to shari@capital
reportingcompany.com.
Florida. Busy, long-established firm seeks
reporters throughout state of Florida. Main
office located in Orlando. Payment biweekly
on billings. 800-275-7991. Fax 407-8984955.
Broward/Miami/WPB, Florida. Immediate
opening for an experienced reporter to do
depositions, hearings, and trials. Elite Reporting, 954-761-8338.
Ft. Myers, Florida. Reporting firm seeks fullor part-time reporter. RPR a plus. Professional work environment; excellent support
staff. Payment monthly on billings. Fax résumé to 239-481-1451 or call 239-481-1300.
Miami/Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. Privately
owned firm seeks criminal/federal court
experienced reporters for full or part-time
court work. Payment semi-monthly; 16 day
hold back. 954-467-8204.
Punta Gorda/Southwest, Florida. Full-time
regional reporter needed. Relocation assistance, incentive package, and a lucrative
career income. Work from home and e-mail
jobs in. Biweekly pay. Call 888-227-3335 or
e-mail CV/résumé to [email protected].
CLASSIFIEDS
Busy, long-established firm
seeks reporters. Payment biweekly on billings. 800-275-7991. Fax 407-898-4955.
Atlanta, Georgia. Reporter appreciation is
our focus. Premier Reporting is your answer
to finding a supportive professional working
environment. We accommodate reporters
with flexible working schedules and payment every two weeks for work billed out.
99 percent of our assignments are depositions. Realtime work available. Please contact Carole at 404-237-1990, 800-317-5773,
or e-mail résumé to info@premierreport
ing.com. Inquiries kept confidential.
Atlanta, Georgia. We are growing by leaps
and bounds and would love to talk to you
about a position with our firm. We assign
jobs by 2 p.m. each day and feature up-front
pay, many all-day depositions, and lots of
realtime and rough draft work, as well as
an experienced and supportive office staff.
Part-time and full-time positions. Health insurance and retirement benefits. Visit www.
tiffanyalley.com for what our reporters have
to say about working at Tiffany Alley. E-mail
[email protected]. Call 800-808-4958.
Savannah, Georgia. Court reporter position open. 20-year established firm has immediate opening for experienced reporter.
Must be RPR or Georgia state certified. 99
percent deposition work, paid on billables.
Competitive benefits package. Please call
Dennis at McKee Court Reporting 800894-8322 or e-mail [email protected].
Honolulu, Hawaii. What is a near-perfect
freelance court reporting position? How
about 95 percent of all work in a three square
block area, or 95 percent of all jobs are depositions, or friendly and quick-paying clients,
or the best weather in the nation consistently, or being able to office out of your home,
or working with the largest reporting firm in
the state, or spending no time on billing, collecting, delivering, binding, or any administrative tasks … just reporting or being close
to the sky blue Pacific Ocean ­every day. How
about all the above and more! That’s what
we are talking about. Give us a call. We are
looking for two RPRs who desire to make a
positive change in their lives. Call Ralph at
888-524-5888, Ralph Rosenberg Court Reporters, Inc., Honolulu, Hawaii.
Idaho. The largest court reporting firm in
the Northwest United States has openings in Coeur d’Alene, Boise, Spokane, and
other locations throughout Idaho. Excellent
deposition clientele and earning potential.
Immediately paid for all work turned in. Enthusiasm, team spirit, and professionalism
required. Realtime a plus. Full or part-time
welcome. Contact us at 800-528-3335 or email [email protected].
Chicago, Illinois. Family owned firm seeking
full-time reporters for northern suburbs and
downtown. Fast-paced court and deposition
work. Excellent pay. E-mail your qualificaTampa, Florida.
tions, [email protected], or
fax, 847-244-7269.
Chicago, Illinois. Downtown and suburban
reporters needed for busy freelance agency.
High percentage of write-ups. Multiple-copy
transcripts. Great clientele. Friendly staff
support. No seniority system. Wide variety of
litigation. Contact Michelle Monti at 312236-6936 or [email protected].
Louisiana. Well-established court reporting
firm in the Central Business District of New
Orleans, additional offices located in Baton
Rouge and Mandeville, La. In search of a
dedicated realtime reporter (machine writers only please), hardworking, self-motivated, and willing to travel. We have the latest
technology and excellent staff support. Contact Shana at 504-525-9100. Fax 504-5259109. Gaudet Kaiser, L.L.C., 601 Poydras
St., Suite 203, New Orleans, LA 70130.
Baltimore,
Maryland/Washington,
D.C.
Experienced RPRs or CSRs needed for full
or part-time employment with very busy office and great clients. Med mal our specialty.
No seniority system, longest jobs go to most
up-to-date reporters. Can earn $150,000
plus for right person. We pay primarily on
commission, every two weeks for all work
turned in, originals and copies. Owner enjoys finest reputation for sincerity with clients, court reporters, and staff and holds
the Certificate of Merit with over 45 years
experience. Several interesting perks can
be earned including extra commissions for
successful marketing efforts and sign-on bonuses for right person. Send résumé to art@
miller.com or call Art Miller & Associates at
800-837-2285. Confidentiality guaranteed.
Boston, Massachusetts. Busy, well-established firm has immediate openings for experienced freelance reporters with expertise
in realtime and medical/technical work. Paid
in full twice monthly for all work received.
Excellent income potential. Friendly and
professional environment with full support
staff. Bright, aggressive grads also welcome.
Please fax résumé to Human Resources at
O’Brien & Levine Court Reporting Services,
617-399-0114, call 617-399-0130, or e-mail:
[email protected]. You can visit us at
www.court-reporting.com.
Boston, Massachusetts. Established firm
would like to add staff. Promising beginners as well as experienced professionals
welcome. Must be realtime capable or motivated to do so quickly. Fax, mail, or e-mail
résumé with telephone number. Contact
Mahaney Reporting Services, 43 Kingston
St., 3rd Floor, Boston, MA 02111. Phone:
617-542-4207; fax: 617-338-0119; or e-mail
[email protected].
Kansas City, Missouri. Very busy, reputable
firm has openings for experienced reporters and bright, skilled graduates. Excellent
compensation package and high earnings
possible. Interesting work, 95 percent depositions, excellent attorneys, helpful staff.
Pleasant working environment. Stress and
whining are discouraged. Please fax 913492-2242 or e-mail [email protected] your
résumé today.
Lexington, Kentucky. Immediate opening
for experienced reporter, busy freelance firm.
Professional and friendly working environment with full support staff; 100 percent
deposition work; excellent clientele. E-mail
[email protected] or fax résumé to 859252-4221.
New Hampshire. Reporters needed ASAP.
Experienced reporters needed for high-volume freelance office in sales and income tax
free New Hampshire. Excellent income potential. Primarily depositions. Send résumé
to: Andrew Vangjel, Bragan Reporting Associates, 1087 Elm St., Suite 311, Manchester,
NH 03101. [email protected].
Binghamton, New York. Reporters: supportive atmosphere, employee status, all
benefits including retirement, busy and wellestablished firm three hours from NYC, all
types of reporting, including overseas appointments. New grads and experienced
reporters. Ann Kenyon, Czerenda Court
Reporting, 800-633-9149.
Buffalo, New York. Well-established firm
of 49 years has immediate openings for freelance reporters. Great work environment
with excellent income potential in a very
easy city. Metschl & Associates, 295 Main
St. Suite 1090, Buffalo, NY 14203. 716-8561906.
Cincinnati, Ohio. Prestigious firm seeks fulltime reporter. Will train serious beginners.
Immediate openings. Fax or e-mail résumé
to 513-381-3342; [email protected]; or
call 513-381-3330.
Dayton, Ohio. Experienced reporter needed
for highly respected local firm. Employee
status. Computer and software provided. Email résumé to [email protected].
Oregon. The largest court reporting firm in
the Northwest United States has openings
in Portland, Salem, Eugene, Bend, Medford,
and other locations throughout Oregon. Excellent deposition clientele and earning potential. Immediately paid for all work turned
in. Enthusiasm, team spirit, and professionalism required. Realtime a plus. Full or parttime welcome. Contact us at 800-528-3335
or e-mail [email protected].
Pennsylvania. Full- and part-time reporters
for busy freelance firm. Seeking reporters for
deposition work throughout Pennsylvania,
New Jersey, and Delaware. Great support
staff. Call Jeff at 610-355-1948, or e-mail
[email protected].
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Work for a
woman-owned company whose motto is:
“We are nothing without our reporters!”
We provide great perks like payment every
two weeks and mentoring for new reporters.
E-mail your résumé to shari@capitalreport
ingcompany.com.
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
65
CLASSIFIEDS
Need a switch? Come to
work for a firm that treats its reporters like
its clients! Positions available at all levels
— from beginners to high-volume realtime
writers. Office locations in Myrtle Beach,
Columbia, Charleston, and Greenville. Call
Bill at A. William Roberts, Jr. & Associates,
800-743-3376, fax résumé to 843-722-4926,
or e-mail [email protected].
Texas. Busy, progressive, full-service firm
with nice offices in Midland and Odessa,
Texas in need of two or three reporters.
Must be certified in Texas. Will pay extra for
Certified Realtime Reporters. Call Loretta
at 432-683-3032.
Virginia. Well-established, busy firm is
looking for full- or part-time court reporters
to join our team. No seniority system.
Independent contractor status. Paid twice
monthly on work billed out. Office support
staff handles all production. Our offices are
located in Harrisonburg and Charlottesville.
We cover those areas and all counties in
between. Wonderful opportunity to live in
our beautiful four-season state and work
in a professional environment.
E-mail
your résumé with a cover letter, including
the equipment/software used, to karen@
hartreporting.com.
South Carolina.
sociates at 901-528-1168, e-mail [email protected], or fax résumé to
901-528-1167.
Wheeling/Morgantown area, West Virginia/Eastern Ohio area. Established, busy
deposition firm seeking experienced court
reporters. No seniority system. Benefits
available. Employee or independent contractor status. Full support staff to handle
printing to delivery. Fax résumé to 304-2329375, or call Tami at 304-232-9292.
Virginia Beach/Norfolk/Peninsula, Virginia. Opening for court reporter for all phases
of reporting. Contact G. Fleet at fleetjo2@
cox.net. 757-622-2049.
Washington. The largest court reporting
firm in the Northwest United States has
openings in Seattle, Spokane, Tacoma,
Tri-Cities, and other locations throughout
Washington. Excellent deposition clientele
and earning potential. Immediately paid for
all work turned in. Enthusiasm, team spirit,
and professionalism required. Realtime a
plus. Full- or part-time welcome. Contact
us at 800-528-3335 or e-mail info@
naegelireporting.com.
Seattle/Tacoma, Washington. Byers &
Anderson, Inc., has openings for independent contracting court reporters through
its Seattle and Tacoma offices. We’ve been
around since 1980, have lots of work with
loyal local and national clients, enjoy bayview offices, and employ a friendly, supportive staff who provides full production
for you. We welcome both experienced and
new reporters, so come join us in beautiful Western Washington! Visit www.byers
anderson.com, see our ad in the JCR, and
call Jenni Anderson with your inquiries at
800-649-2034.
Tennessee. Busy, well established firm in
Memphis has immediate openings for freelance reporters. Paid in full twice monthly
on billings, retirement plan, benefits, large
deposition volume. Case Catalyst or Eclipse
preferred. Excellent income potential.
Friendly and professional environment with
full support staff. Call Morrow and As66
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
Did you know
the JCR
Classifieds are
online for
NCRA members?
The NCRA JCR Classifieds
are available online to
NCRA Members 24/7
and are
updated weekly.
Go to:
www.NCRAonline.org
under Member
Resources.
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See Page 7
WELCOME TO NCRA
The following are new NCRA reporter and
associate members as of December 2009
and January 2010, listed by state or country.
Endorser’s name, where available, appears
following the new member’s address.
NEW PARTICIPATING MEMBERS
Penny Lee Enoch, Leeds, AL
Jackie F. Parham, Montgomery, AL
Sandra L. Marruffo, Phoenix, AZ
Cheryl L. Wilder, Phoenix, AZ
Vanna Soeur, Bellflower, CA
Shelley Liane Hill, Irvine, CA
Adriana Gai, Kingsburg, CA
Kelly Kilzer, La Mirada, CA
Anne Bryant, Long Beach, CA
Rose Marie Ferronato, Rohnert Park, CA
Stacey L. Dettmers, Sun City, CA
Diana Marie Kuypers, Walnut Creek, CA
Tracy Romano Anderson, De Leon
Springs, FL
Coleen S. Clark, Miami, FL
Daniel E. Thompson, Naples, FL
Lisa C. Snyder, Tallahassee, FL
Karri Rogers, Altoona, IA
Roselind C. Pisano, Chicago, IL
Deborah M. Tyrrell, Wheaton, IL
Stephanie Matherne Hill, Youngsville, LA
Steven Zeigler, Adamstown, MD
Sara A. Cissin, Linthicum Heights, MD
Linda S. Feeney, Parkton, MD
Kimberly A. McCallum, Ramsey, MN
Victoria Lauren Reeves, Clinton, MS
Carrie Beam, Charlotte, NC
Beth McLamb Hill, Winterville, NC
Linda Anne Jackson, Petersburg, NJ
Holly Lucia Hough, Somerville, NJ
Michele M. Trujillo, Albuquerque, NM
Denise Caruso, Babylon, NY
Karen D. Williams, Brooklyn, NY
Pessi Goldstein, Cedarhurst, NY
Barbara A. Saporito, East Atlantic Beach,
NY
Holly Ann Baine, Jericho, NY
Anna M. Teresi, Kenmore, NY
Lauren Torres, Levittown, NY
Christina Diaz, Lindenhurst, NY
Otis Davis, New York, NY
Beth B. Barrett, Potsdam, NY
Mark Kress, Rochester, NY
Laura Elizabeth Thornsberry, Columbus,
OH
Rebecca Ann Baker, Newark, OH
Veronica Williams, Toledo, OH
Wendy Sugrue, Bethany, OK
Janet Dransfield, Blue Bell, PA
Celeste Elena Tartaglia, Harleysville, PA
Valerie Denise Lawrence, Philadelphia,
PA
Colleen Fila, Waymart, PA
Lisa H Davenport, Aiken, SC
Karen Tracy, Columbia, SC
Dana Michele Mears, Lexington, SC
Wendy Alexander, Carrollton, TX
Kelly Colleen Hassell, Dallas, TX
Michael David Clepper, Houston, TX
Karen Lee Grossbier, Wisconsin Rapids,
WI
Sarah M. Humble, Charleston, WV
Samanta C. Huggins-Baker, Kingstown,
St. Vincent, West Indies
NEW ASSOCIATE MEMBERS
John Donoho, CLVS, Phoenix, AZ,
Diane Donoho, RPR
Carol Lynne Shipman, CLVS, Phoenix,
AZ
Mark Spearin, CLVS, Alta Loma, CA,
Gary R. Blando, RPR, CLVS
Josie M. Carrillo, El Dorado Hills, CA
Lynette DeWilde, Los Angeles, CA, Kim
M. A. Krueger
Patricia Ellen Lynch, Rancho
Cucamonga, CA
P. Catherine Vade Bon Coeur,
Sacramento, CA
Charles Allan Neville, Ventura, CA
Bebe C. Michels, Woodland Hills, CA
Gregory M. Addeo, Washington, DC
Tara L. Martin, Pinellas Park, FL
Mark Charles Refuss, CLVS, Fayetteville,
GA, Gary R. Blando, RPR, CLVS
Shelley Marie Duhon, Iowa, LA, Annette
M. Montalvo, RMR
Lydia Alexander, Baltimore, MD
Daniel J. Miller, CLVS, Baltimore, MD
Nancy Fisher, Howell, MI
Wanda Lynn Davis, Gulfport, MS, Gary
R. Blando, RPR, CLVS
Jennifer A. Ocampo-Guzman, Colonia,
NJ
David J. DaSilva, CLVS, Florham Park, NJ
Douglass J. Gerash, CLVS, Santa Fe, NM,
Vivien R. Spitz, RMR (Ret)
T.J. Picozzi, CLVS, Commack, NY, Gary
R. Blando, RPR, CLVS
John Afrides, CLVS, Sunnyside, NY, Gary
R. Blando, RPR, CLVS
Patty Humbert, Maumee, OH, Annette
M. Montalvo, RMR
Jackie Arguijo, CLVS, Dallas, TX, Gary
R. Blando, RPR, CLVS
Tiffannee Conley, CLVS, Dallas, TX,
Gary R. Blando, RPR, CLVS
Tamra T. Gonzalez, CLVS, Dallas, TX
Carl Seyer, CLVS, Dallas, TX
Corinne A. Sorensen, CRI, CPE,
Houston, TX
Jenny Atkins, CLVS, Richardson, TX
Tracey Tompkins, Sugar Land, TX,
Pamela J. Gwin Coder
Christine M. Burbridge, Ottawa, ON,
Canada, D’Arcy C. McPherson, RDR,
CRR, CBC, CCP, CRI
Allison Bend, Toronto, ON, Canada,
Wade S. Garner, RPR, CPE
Menna Bridget Rondel, Epping, N.S.W.,
Australia, Colleen Patricia Stacey
NCRA 2010
FOR
Annual Convention & Exposition
August 5–8, 2010 Chicago, IL
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
69
CALENDAR
NCRA Certification
Notes
ties, and examination start times are subject to change, so please be sure to visit
the NCRA Web site for the most up-todate information.
SKILLS EXAMINATION NOTES
Registration is now open (March 1–31)
for the next RPR, RMR, CRR, CBC, and
CCP skills examinations on May 1, 2010.
Please note: Candidates whose registrations are not received by NCRA by the
deadline — March 31 — will not be eligible to sit for the May 1 skills examinations.
Forms to register for the 2010 skills
examinations are available in the NCRA
Spring 2010 Candidate Handbook that
was included in the February issue of JCR
or online by visiting the NCRA Certification Test Center at http://NCRAonline.org/
certification/testing.
Registrations for the skills examinations are accepted only via mail and Internet. Fax registrations cannot be accepted, so be sure to allow adequate time
to ensure that your registration is received
by NCRA not later than the March 31
deadline.
To register for the May 1 RPR skills
examinations, you must be a member of
NCRA, and your dues must have been
paid in full by March 1, 2010.
Those interested in registering for the
May 1 RMR skills examinations must be
both a member of NCRA and an RPR.
Testing locations for the May 1 skills
examination can be found online at
NCRA’s website at http://NCRAonline.org/
certification/testing/testinglocations. Register early for the best possible chance of
taking the test at your preferred testing
site. A reminder: Testing cities, facili-
WRITTEN KNOWLEDGE EXAMINATION NOTES
Registration is also now open (March
1–31) for the written knowledge examinations scheduled for April 5–17, 2010 for
the RPR, RMR, RDR, CBC, CCP, and
CLVS. Please note: Your registration must
be received by NCRA by the deadline –
March 31 — or you will not be eligible to
sit for the written knowledge examinations being offered April 5–17.
Forms to register for the 2010 written
knowledge examinations are available
in the NCRA Spring 2010 Candidate
Handbook that was included in the
February issue of JCR or online by visiting
the NCRA Certification Test Center at
http://NCRAonline.org/certification.
Registrations for the written knowledge examinations are accepted only via
mail and Internet. Fax registrations cannot be accepted, so be sure to allow adequate time to ensure that your registration
is received by NCRA not later than the
March 31 deadline.
To apply for the RMR written knowledge examination, you must be an RPR
and have three (3) years of current continuous NCRA membership commencing with Participating or Register member
status.
To sit for the RDR written knowledge
examination, you must be an RMR and
have six (6) current continuous years of
List Your Event in the JCR Calendar
Contact Desi Hurlocker at NCRA by e-mail, [email protected], or fax, 703556-6291. Include the dates of the event, the sponsoring group, where it will be held,
and who to contact for more information. Deadline for submission is 60 days before
the month of publication. Listings published as space allows. The JCR is not published in
August or December.
To List Your Event on the Online Calendar
Go to www.NCRAonline.org/Events/, click on “Submit New Event,” and follow
the instructions. Your event will be online within 48 hours. Placing your event
on the online calendar will not automatically place it in the JCR Calendar. Please
follow the instructions above to place your event in the JCR.
70
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
membership commencing with Participating or Registered member status.
Please allow 24 hours after your registration date for the processing of your
written knowledge examination registration through NCRA, and receipt of your
Candidate Status Report from NCRA as
to your eligibility to register with one of
the Pearson VUE testing facilities. After
receiving notification from NCRA, we encourage you to register early with Pearson
VUE to obtain the testing date and time
of your choice during the April 5–17 testing period. To register with Pearson VUE,
and for a complete listing of available testing facilities, please visit www.pearsonvue.
com/ncra.
2010 SPRING CERTIFICATION
PROGRAM DATES TO REMEMBER
MAR
1–31Registration dates for the April
5-17 RPR, RMR, RDR, CBC,
CCP, and CLVS written knowledge examinations
1–31Registration dates for the May 1
RPR, RMR, CRR, CBC and
CCP skills examinations
APR
5–17Testing window with Pearson
VUE for the RPR, RMR, RDR,
CRR, CBC, CCP and CLVS
written knowledge examination
MAY
1RPR, RMR, CRR, CBC, and
CCP skills examination
NEED MORE INFORMATION?
The NCRA Web site (www.NCRAonline.org) contains the most comprehen-
sive information on the RPR, RMR, RDR,
CRR, CBC, CCP, and CLVS credentials.
You call also call NCRA’s Membership
Services Information Center (MSIC) tollfree at 800-272-6272.
Or, feel free to e-mail the NCRA Department of Certification and Testing at
[email protected].
Best of luck in your pursuit of professional credentialing and certification!
CALENDAR
Upcoming NCRA Events
NCRA Midyear Conference
March 12–14, 2010
Hyatt Regency, Embarcadero Center
San Francisco, Calif.
NCRA Annual Convention and Exposition
August 5–8, 2010
Hilton Chicago, Chicago, Ill.
Meetings and Seminars
Continuing education units have been or are expected to be requested for the following events. However, application for a specific number of units is no guarantee that that number of units, if
any, will be granted. This listing is believed to be accurate at the
time of publication, but NCRA is not responsible for any misunderstandings, disappointments, or other consequences of an event
being included in or omitted from this listing. Statements of fact
and opinion made at seminars that are listed in this calendar or
that receive CEUs from NCRA are made on the responsibility of
the speakers alone and do not imply an opinion or endorsement
by NCRA.
25–27StenoCAT Users Network Spring Annual Convention,
Las Vegas, Nev. For more information, contact Beth
Howard, [email protected].
26–28Utah CRA Annual Convention, “Illuminate You.” Visit
www.utcra.com, seminars tab for information.
27Georgia Shorthand Reporters Association Technology
Seminar. Clayton State University near Atlanta. Get all
of your NCRA and GSRA credits in one day. Case Catalyst, Eclipse, and Stenovations will be presenting. For
more info visit GSRA.org or call Kathy Sherwood, GSRA
President, 770-565-4644. E-mail is [email protected].
April
16–18Wisconsin Court Reporters Association Spring Convention. The Plaza Hotel & Suites, Eau Claire, Wis. For
more information, visit www.wicourtreporters.org.
17ACRA Midyear Seminar, Holiday Inn, Mesa, Ariz. For
more information, visit http://www.acraonline.org.
23–24USCRA Midyear Seminar. Chaparral Suites Resort,
Scottsdale, Ariz. For more information contact Terri
Martin, 515-284-6444.
June
MARCh
6San Diego Superior Court Reporters Association seminar. For more information, contact Sue Holthaus, 619340-7070 or e-mail [email protected].
12–14NCRA Midyear Conference, Hyatt Regency,
Embarcadero Center, San Francisco, Calif. Contact NCRA’s MSIC, 800-272-6272; www.NCRA
11–12Kansas Court Reporters Association Convention. Capitol Plaza, Topeka, Kansas. Contact Lynelle Gottschalk,
785-628-9415.
10–13Tennessee Court Reporters Association Annual Convention. Hilton Memphis. Contact Lynette Mueller,
901-827-8671, or e-mail [email protected].
online.org.
september
12–14VCRA Annual Convention, The Homestead, Hot
Springs, Va. Visit www.vcra.net.
12–13CCRA-New Jersey Annual Spring Convention. Sheraton Newark Airport Hotel. For more info visit http://
10–11Kentucky Court Reporters Association Annual Convention, Louisville. Contact Lois Webb, 859-230-7639.
www.ccra-nj.com/.
october
14–15NCRA Board of Directors meeting. San Francisco,
Calif. NCRA Board meeting are open to all NCRA
members. Contact NCRA Member Services and Information Center, 800-272-6272; www.NCRAonline.org.
18–20STAR Midyear Conference, Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino, Las Vegas, Nev. For more information contact, Jessie Laux, 407-571-1123.
19–21Ohio CRA Annual Conference; 1.4 CEUs will be offered in a dual program arrangement. The Hagestrom
Speed Cup and the Realtime Contest will be held in
conjunction with the conference. For more information,
see ocraonline.com or contact [email protected].
19–21Nevada Court Reporters Association Annual Convention at the beautiful new M Resort & Spa in Las Vegas,
Nev., featuring Mark Kislingbury. For information, contact Mary Cox Daniel, [email protected].
2–3Maryland Court Reporters Association’s annual convention, Wisp Resort in Deep Creek Lake, Md. Contact
Linda Larson, 717-243-9770 or visit www.mcra.org.
8–10The New York State Court Reporters Association
(NYSRA) Convention at the Seneca Niagara Casino &
Hotel, Niagara Falls, N.Y. Contact Lori Strong, 716-4819939, or visit www.nyscra.org.
or a complete list of upcoming events, go to
F
NCRA’s Interactive Calendar at www.NCRAonline.
org.
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
71
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NCRA LIST OF CERTIFIED COURT REPORTER TRAINING PROGRAMS
The court reporter training
programs offered at the
following institutions are
committed to excellence in
realtime reporter education
and have met the General
Requirements and Minimum Standards (GRMS)
established by the Council
on Approved Student
Education (CASE) of the
National Court Reporters
Association, earning the
right to describe themselves as “NCRA Certified.”
In order to achieve and
maintain certification,
these programs agree to
periodic review by CASE
to verify their continued
adherence to the GRMS.
Each training program is
identified as being certified
for specific modes of delivery; on-site day, on-site
evening, and online.
NCRA is not an accrediting agency; however, all
NCRA-certified programs
are accredited by agencies
recognized by the U.S.
Department of Education.
Each institution’s transfer
of credit policy is governed
by the standards of the
particular agency accrediting that institution.
The court reporter training programs offered at
institutions with participating programs are listed on
the following page. While
not subject to independent
review by CASE, these
programs have stated their
commitment providing
realtime reporter education
by being able to access all
NCRA resources, and may
or may not be accredited
by agencies recognized by
the U. S. Department of
Education. (Accreditation
status should be verified
with the institution.)
As of December 2009
ALABAMA
c ali f ornia
Bryan College
3580 Wilshire Blvd., #400
Los Angeles, CA 90010
213-484-8850 (D, N) (A)
(ON)
www.bryancollege.edu
Sage College
(formerly California School
of Court Reporting)
12125 Day Street
Building L
Moreno Valley, CA 925576720
951-781-2727 (D, N) (ON)
www.sagecollege.edu
South Coast College
2011 W. Chapman Ave.
Orange, CA 92868
714-867-5009 (D, N) (A)
(BC, CT)
www.southcoastcollege.com
Tri-Community Adult
Education
16209 East San Bernardino
Rd.
Covina, CA 91722
626-472-7681 (D, EC)
cvusd.k12.ca.us/tri-community/
courtreporting/html
West Valley College
14000 Fruitvale Ave.
Saratoga, CA 95070
408-741-2439 (D) (A)
www.westvalley.edu
C O LO R A D O
Denver Academy of
Court Reporting
9051 Harlan Street, Unit
20
Westminster, CO 80031
303-427-5292 (D, N) (A)
www.dacr.org
F LO R I D A
Atlantic Technical
Center
4700 Coconut Creek Pkwy.
Coconut Creek, FL 33063
754-321-5235 (D)
www.atlantictechcenter.com
Erwin Technical Center
2010 East Hillsborough
Ave.
Tampa, FL 33610
813-231-1800 (D)
Gadsden State
Community College
1001 E. Broad St.
P.O. Box 227
Gadsden, AL 35902-0227
256-549-8627 (D) (A) (BC)
www.erwin.edu
www.gadsdenstate.edu
Sheridan Technical
Center
5400 Sheridan St.
Hollywood, FL 33021
754-321-5400, ext. 3073
(D)
Prince Institute of
Professional Studies
7735 Atlanta Highway
Montgomery, AL 36117
334-271-1670
877-853-5569 (D, EC) (A)
(ON)A
www.princeinstitute.edu
aRIZONA
GateWay Community
College
108 North 40th St.
Phoenix, AZ 85034
602-286-8000 (D, EC) (A
Key College
225 E. Dania Beach Blvd.
Dania, FL 33004
954-923-4440 (D, N) (A)
www.keycollege.edu
www.SheridanTechnical.com
MICHIGAN
OHIO
Macomb Community
College
14500 E. 12 Mile Rd.
Warren, MI 48088-3896
586-226-4803 (N)
Academy of Court
­Reporting
2930 West Market St.
Akron, OH 44333
330-867-4030 (D, N) (A)
www.courtreportingjax.com
www.macomb.edu
www.acr.edu
Winter Park Tech
901 Webster Ave.
Winter Park, FL 32789
407-622-2900 (D, N)
Academy of Court
Reporting
1055 West Maple Rd.
Clawson, MI 48017
248-435-9030 (D, N)
Academy of Court
Reporting & Technology
2044 Euclid Avenue
Cleveland, OH 44115
216-861-3222 (D, N) (A)
www.acr.edu
www.acr.edu
minneso ta
Clark State
Community College
100 S. Limestone St.
P.O. Box 570
Springfield, OH 45501
937-328-8080 (D) (BC,
CT) (A)
Stenotype Institute of
Jacksonville
3563 Phillips Hwy.
Bldg. E, #501
Jacksonville, FL 32207
800-273-5090 (D, N)
904-398-4141
www.wpt.ocps.net
GEORGIA
Brown College of Court
Reporting & Medical
Transcription
1900 Emery Street
#200 Buckhead West
Atlanta, GA 30318
800-849-0703
404-876-1227 (D, N)
(BC, CT)
Anoka Technical
College
Judicial Reporting/
Broadcast Captioning
1355 West Highway 10
Anoka, MN 55303
763-576-4897 (D) (BC,
CT) (A)
www.browncollege.com
www.Anokatech.edu
ILLINOIS
MISSISSIPPI
MacCormac College
29 E. Madison
Chicago, IL 60602-4405
312-922-1884 (D, N) (A)
www.maccormac.edu
Midstate College
411 W Northmoor Road
Peoria, IL 61614
309-692-4092 (D) (A)
www.midstate.edu
South Suburban
College
16333 South Kilbourn Ave.
Oak Forest, IL 60452
708-596-2000, ext. 3216
(D) (A)
www.southsuburbancollege.edu
Sparks College
131 South Morgan St.
Shelbyville, IL 62565
217-774-5112 (D)
www.sparkscollege.org
INDIANA
College of Court
­Reporting Inc.
111 W. 10th St., #111
Hobart, IN 46342
219-942-1459
(D, N) (A) (BC) (ON)
www.ccr.edu
IOWA
Hinds Community
College
Court Reporting
Technology
P.O. Box 1100
Raymond, MS 39154-1100
601-857-3417 (D, N) (A)
www.hindscc.edu
N E VA D A
Everest College
170 N. Stephanie
Suite 1435
Henderson, NV 89074
702-567-1920 (D, N) (A)
www.lasvegas-college.com
NEW MEXICO
Central New Mexico
Community College
525 Buena Vista SE
Albuquerque, NM 871064096
505-224-3894, ext. 0457
(D) (A) (BC)
www.cnm.edu
N E W YO R K
Alfred State College
215 E. J Brown Hall
Alfred, NY 14802
607-587-3427 (D) (BC)
(ON)
www.alfredstate.edu
AIB College of Business
2500 Fleur Dr.
Des Moines, IA 50321
515-244-4221
(D, EC) (A) (BC)
Business Informatics
Center
134 South Central Avenue
Valley Stream, NY 11580
PH: 516-561-0050 (D) (A)
www.aib.edu
www.thecollegeforbusiness.com
KANSAS
Long Island Business
Institute
6500 Jericho Turnpike
Commack, NY 11725
631-499-7100 (D, N) (A)
Butler Community
College
715 East 13th Street
Andover, KS 67002
316-281-6300 (D)
www.butlercc.edu
www.libi.edu
New York Career
Institute
11 Park Place, Fourth Floor
New York, NY 10007
212-962-0002 (D, N) (A)
www.clarkstate.edu
Cuyahoga Community
College
Western Campus
11000 Pleasant Valley Rd.
Parma, OH 44130
216-987-5214
(D, N) (A) (ON)
www.tri-c.edu
Miami-Jacobs Career
College
150 East Gay Street
Columbus, OH 43215
614-221-7700 (D, N) (A)
www.acr.edu
Miami-Jacobs Career
College
630 Main Street, 12th Floor
Cincinnati, OH 45202
513-723-0520 (D, N) (A)
Stark State College of
Technology
6200 Frank Ave., N.W.
Canton, OH 44720
330-966-5453 ext. 4359
(D) (BC) (ON)
www.starkstate.edu
Stautzenberger College
8001 Katherine Boulevard
Brecksville, OH 44041
www.learnwhatyoulove.com
440-838-1999
(D, N) (BC)
Stautzenberger College
1796 Indian Wood Circle
Maumee, OH 43537
419-866-0261
(D) (EC) (BC)
www.sctoday.edu
OREGON
Sumner College
8909 SW Barbur Blvd.,
#100
Portland, OR 97219
503-923-3431 (D, EC)
www.collegeoflegalarts.com
P E N N S Y LVA N I A
Academy of Court
Reporting & Technology
235 4th Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15222
412-535-0560 (D, N) (A)
www.acr.edu
www.NYCI.com
www.gatewaycc.edu
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
73
NCRA LIST OF CERTIFIED COURT REPORTER TRAINING PROGRAMS
Community College of
­Allegheny County
808 Ridge Ave.
Pittsburgh, PA 15212-6097
412-237-2748 (D) (A)
www.ccac.edu
Orleans Technical
Institute
2770 Red Lion Road
Philadelphia, PA 19114
215-728-4700 (D, N) (A)
www.orleanstech.edu
SOUTH
CAROLINA
Midlands Technical
College
P.O. Box 2408
Columbia, SC 29202
803-822-7037 (D) (A)
www.midlandstech.edu
TENNESSEE
Chattanooga State
Technical Community
College
7158 Lee Highway
Chattanooga, TN 37421
423-697-2551
(D) (A) (BC, CT)
www.chattanoogastate.edu
TEXAS
Alvin Community
College
3110 Mustang Rd.
Alvin, TX 77511
281-756-3757 (D) (A) (BC,
CT)
www.alvincollege.edu
Arlington Career
Institute
901 Ave. K
Grand Prairie, TX 75050
972-647-1607
(D)
www.arlingtonci.com
Court Reporting
Institute of Dallas
1341 W. Mockingbird Ln.,
#200 East
Dallas, TX 75247
214-350-9722 (D, N) (A)
(ON)
www.crid.com
Court Reporting
Institute of Houston
13101 Northwest Freeway
Suite 100
Houston, TX 77040
866-996-8330 (Toll Free)
713-996-8300 (D, N) (A)
www.crid.com
Kilgore College —
Longview
300 S. High Street
Longview, TX 75601
903-753-2642 (D) (A)
Kussad Institute of
Court Reporting
2800 South IH-35, #110
Austin, TX 78704
512-443-7286 (D)
www.kicr1.com
VIRGINIA
Fortis College
6300 Center Drive, #22
Norfolk, VA 23502
757-499-5447 (D)
www.vstsuccess.com
W A S H I N GT O N
Green River Community
College
12401 S.E. 320th St.
Auburn, WA 98092
253-833-9111 ext. 4319
(D, EC) (A) (BC, CT)
www.greenriver.edu
WEST
VIRGINIA
Huntington Junior
College
900 Fifth Ave.
Huntington, WV 25701
304-697-7550
800-344-4522 (D) (A)
(BC, CT, ON)
www.huntingtonjuniorcollege.
edu
WISCONSIN
Lakeshore Technical
College
1290 North Ave.
Cleveland, WI 53015
920-693-1353
888-GOTOLTC (D) (A)
www.gotoltc.edu
Madison Area Technical
College
3550 Anderson St.
Madison, WI 53704
608-246-6100 (D) (A)
(BC)
www.matcmadison.edu
CANADA
Canadian Centre for
Verbatim Studies
10 St. Mary St., #504
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
M4Y 1P9
www.verbatimstudies.com
416-960-2287 (D) (ON)
Northern Alberta
Institute of Technology
11762 – 106 St.
Edmonton, Alberta,
Canada
T5G 2R1
www.nait.ca
780-471-8351, 8383 (D)
www.kilgore.edu
(D)=Day program leading to graduation. (N)=Complete night program leading to graduation. (EC)=Evening courses. Must transfer to day to complete program.
(BC) = Broadcast Captioning (CT) = CART Provider (ON) = Online Program (A)=Associate degree. (B)=Baccalaureate degree. Contact the program for details.
NCRA LIST OF PARTICIPATING COURT REPORTER TRAINING PROGRAMS
The court reporter training programs offered at
the following institutions
are NCRA-Participating
programs. While not
subject to the independent
review by CASE, these
programs have stated their
commitment providing
realtime reporter education
by being able to access all
NCRA resources, and may
or may not be accredited
by agencies recognized by
the U. S. Department of
Education. (Accreditation
status should be verified
with the institution.)
Golden State College of
Court Reporting
6543 Regional Street
Dublin, CA 94568
925-829-0115
Humphreys College
6650 Inglewood Ave
Stockton, CA 95207
209-478-0800
www.humphreys.edu
KANSAS
Court Reporting Institute of Kansas City
8001 Shawnee Mission
Parkway, Suite 100
Mission, KS 66202
c ali f ornia
www.courtreportingstenowave.
com
Cerritos College
11110 Alondra Blvd.
Norwalk, CA 90650
562-860-2451 ext. 2792
Louisiana
www.cerritos.edu/courtreporting
Cypress College
9200 Valley View
Cypress, CA 90630
714-484-7211
www.cypresscollege.edu
913-432-3315
Baton Rouge School of
Court Reporting
9213 Interline Ave.,
Suite A
Baton Rouge, LA 70809
225-218-4919
www.brscr.com
Court Reporting
Institute of Louisiana
12090 S. Harrell’s Ferry
Road
Baton Rouge, LA 70816
225-292-1950
StenoTech Career
Institute
262 Old New Brunswick
Road, #A
Piscataway, NJ 08854
732-562-1200
M i c higan
www.stenotech.edu
TextStream Institute of
Court Reporting
10291 E. Grand River
Avenue
Suite G
Brighton, MI 48116
810-844-2060
www.textstreaminstitute.com
MISSOURI
St. Louis Community
College Meramec
11333 Big Bend Road
St. Louis, MO 63122
314-984-7433
www.stlcc.cc.mo.us
N ew J ersey
StenoTech Career
Institute
20 Just Road
Fairfield, NJ 07004
973-882-4875
www.stenotech.edu
74
N E W YO R K
The New York School of
Court Reporting and
Career Institute
34 South Broadway
White Plains, NY 10601
914-686-3341
www.Nyschoolofcourtreporting.
com
Realtime Center for
Learning Inc.
2 Mellow Lane
Westbury, NY 11590
516-333-0384
www.realtimecenter.com
Tennessee
Southwest Tennessee
­Community College
5983 Macon Cove
Memphis, TN 38134
901-333-7822
www.suthwest.tn.edu
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
TEXAS
Del Mar College
101 Baldwin
Corpus Christi, TX 78404
361-698-1372
www.delmar.edu
093-095:093-095
7/15/09
2:38 PM
Page 94
2010 NCRA Exam Schedule
NCRA MART
National Certification gets you the recognition
skills
National certification your
gets you
thedeserve!
recognition your skills deserve!
2009
EXAMS
The Written knowledge tests and skills
tests CERTIFICATION
are now offered separately (please
see the schedule belowReminder:
for examination and
Only through
NCRA
registration information). Candidates must register for the written knowledge test and skills test separately
NCRA.
Written Knowledge Test
Examination Dates:
July 6–18, 2009
October 5–17, 2009
Registration Dates:
May 4–June 17, 2009
August 3–September 16, 2009
Examination Dates
Register onlin
e
today at
RAonline.org/t
esting
SKILLS TEST
www.NC
Registration Dates
Skills Test
members may
take the
certification
exams. Renew
your membership
today!
May
1, 2010
March
1–31, 2010
November
7, 2009
August 3–September
16, 2009
August 14, 2010
June 14–July 14, 2010
Exam Fees:
November
6,
2010
September
6–October 6, 2010
NCRA’s Certification Programs are the only
nationally
Registration
Fees
Reporter Written Knowledge
Tests $175
recognized programs that establish your competence as a
reporter, captioner, or CART provider. An NCRA certification is
RPR
and
RMR
Literary,
Jury
and
your
first step
toward
success
as you build
yourCharge,
career.
CRR,
CCP,means
andmore
CBC
skills and
testrespect from
Your
certification
recognition
your clients and employers. It can also mean more job
Administered
at
NCRA-sponsored
testing
opportunities and referrals from fellow reporters.
Student Written Knowledge
Tests $140 $160
Reporter:
Reporter Skills Tests $160
Testimony skillsStudent
testsSkills TestStudent:
$125
$125
sitesRegister online at: www.NCRAonline.org/testing
For more information, call 800-272-NCRA (6272).
Visit www.NCRAonline.org/certification/testing for a list of sites
There is no late registration
Please visit www.NCRAonline.org/certification/testing for updates.
Are you ready for more versatility
August date is for RPR, CRR, CBC, and CCP only.
in your career?
NCRA
SERVING THE REPORTING
AND CAPTIONING
PROFESSIONS
CLVS Seminar/Forum
Become a Certified Legal Video September 25-27, 2009
Atlanta, Georgia
Specialist!
WRITTEN
KNOWLEDGE TEST
Examination
Dates
Registration
Dates
Take the first
step to becoming
a CLVS:
April 5–17, 2010
July 5–17,CLVS
2010 Seminar
October September
4–16, 201025 - 26
March 1–31, 2010
June 1–28, 2010
August 30–September 29, 2010
Legal Video Forum
September
27
Registration
Fees
• Learn the accepted Rules
Choose Between:
Reporter: $175
of Civil Procedure.
• Track A/Hands-On
Student: $140
RPR,
RDR,and
CCP, CBC, and CLVS written knowledge tests.
• GainRMR,
recognition
Workshop to refresh your
prestige associated
with
Administered
at Pearson
Professional Centers by Pearson VUE.
knowledge about equipment
the www.pearsonvue.com/ncra
CLVS designation.
Visit
for a list of testing sites.
set-up, operation, etc.
• If you are an experienced
• Track
Candidates
must
register
through
NCRA
first,
and
then
schedule
theB/New
actualVideo
date
deposition videographer,
Visit
Techniques where you learn
and
location
through
Pearson
VUE.
http://clvs.NCRAonline.org
attend only the
to market your profession,
for more details!
mandatory seminar on
create a Day in the Life video,
Sat., Sept. 26.
and much more.
Earn up
• Do Both! — Move between
to 1.8
the tracks to add more value to
CEUs!
your overall experience!
For more information, visit the Online Certification Center at
http://www.NCRAonline.org/certification/testing, e-mail the Department of
Certification and Testing at [email protected],
or call 800-272-6272.
94
JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS /
JULY–AUGUST 2009
www.NCRAonline.org | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | M A R C H 2 0 1 0
75
COURT REPORTER ACTION LOCATOR
ALABAMA
Freedom Court Reporters..................................... 78
Merrill Corporation.............................................. 78
ALASKA
Northern Lights Realtime & Reporting Inc......... 78
ARIZONA
Atwood Reporting Service................................... 78
Bamford Reporting Services................................. 78
Coash & Coash.................................................... 78
Driver & Nix........................................................ 78
ARKANSAS
Professional Reporters.................................... 78
300 North College, 3rd Floor
Fayetteville, AR 72701
800-376-1006
www.proreporters.com
CALIFORNIA
central california
Wood & Randall................................................... 79
Northern california
Barron & Rich...................................................... 78
Behmke Reporting & Video Services................... 79
CalNorth Reporting Service................................. 79
Combs Reporting Inc............................................ 79
DeSouza & Associates.......................................... 79
Nogara Reporting Service.................................... 78
US. Legal Support................................................ 79
Merill Corporation............................................... 81
Olender Reporting Inc......................................... 80
FLORIDA
Atlantic coast
Elite Reporting...................................................... 81
Laws Reporting Inc............................................... 81
Memory Reporting................................................81
Taylor Jonovic White Gendron............................ 81
Gulf coast
Michael Musetta & Associates Inc...................... 81
Sclafani Williams.................................................. 81
GEORGIA
atlanta metro area
Elizabeth Gallo Court Reporting LLC.................. 82
JPA Reporting, LLC.............................................. 82
Lyon Reporting..................................................... 81
Merrill Corporation.............................................. 82
Premier Reporting................................................ 81
Regency-Brentano Inc.......................................... 82
Tiffany Alley & Associates................................... 81
SOUTH GEORGIA
Memory Reporting Inc......................................... 82
HAWAII
Carnazzo Court Reporters.................................... 82
Ralph Rosenberg Court Reporters Inc................. 82
IDAHO
Naegeli Reporting Corporation............................ 82
southern california
Chase Deposition Services.............................. 79
2300 E. Katella Ave., Suite 175
Anaheim, CA 92806
800-949-8044 • Fax 714-459-8104
www.deposervices.com
Fivecoat and With................................................ 78
Hahn & Bowersock........................................ 78
Serving California
1151 Kalmus, Ste. L-1
Costa Mesa, California
800-660-3187
www.hahnbowersock.com
Hutchings Court Reporters, LLC......................... 79
Karyn Abbott & Associates................................. 78
Kramm & Associates............................................ 79
Merrill Corporation.............................................. 79
Peterson Reporting............................................... 79
COLORADO
Meek & Associates............................................... 80
CONNECTICUT
Niziankiewicz & Miller......................................... 80
Sanders, Gale & Russell....................................... 80
Scribes, Inc........................................................... 80
United Reporters.................................................. 80
DELAWARE
Depositions Delaware LLC................................... 80
Magna Legal Services........................................... 80
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Ace-Federal Reporters Inc................................... 80
Alderson Reporting.............................................. 80
Gore Brothers Reporting & Videoconferencing... 81
L.A.D. Reporting & Digital Videography........ 80
1100 Connecticut Ave., N.W., #850
Washington, DC 20036
800-292-4789 • Fax: 202-861-3425
www.LADReporting.com
76
ILLINOIS
Jensen Reporting Services.................................... 83
McCorkle Reporting....................................... 83
200 N. La Salle St., Suite 300
Chicago, IL 60601
800-622-6755 • FAX 312-263-7494
e-mail:[email protected]
Merrill Corporation.............................................. 83
Midwest Litigation Service...................................83
Sonntag Reporting Service Ltd............................ 82
Sullivan Reporting Company............................... 82
Urlaub, Bowen & Associates Inc......................... 82
Wichmann-Klawitter............................................ 82
INDIANA
John E. Connor & Associates.............................. 83
Stewart-Richardson & Associates Inc.................. 83
IOWA
Huney Vaughn & Associates Ltd......................... 83
Petersen Court Reporters..................................... 83
KANSAS
Gene Dolginoff & Associates Ltd........................ 83
Midwest Litigation Service...................................83
KENTUCKY
Spangler Reporting Services................................. 83
MARYLAND
Art Miller & Associates....................................... 84
CRC Salomon....................................................... 84
Evans Reporting Service....................................... 84
Gore Brothers Reporting & Video Co. Inc.......... 84
MASSACHUSETTS
Bramanti & Lyons................................................ 84
Doris O. Wong Associates Inc.............................. 84
Eyal Court Reporting Services Inc....................... 84
Farmer Arsenault Brock LLC............................... 84
M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
Merrill Corporation.............................................. 84
O’Brien & Levine................................................. 84
MICHIGAN
Bienenstock Court Reporting & Video........... 85
Covering the Entire State of Michigan
888-644-8080 • Fax: 248-644-1120
www.bienenstock.com
Chapa & Giblin.................................................... 84
Hanson/Renaissance Court Reporters................. 85
MINNESOTA
Benchmark — A Reporting Agency.................... 85
Chris Columbus Court Reporters......................... 85
Kirby A. Kennedy & Associates........................... 85
Depo International............................................... 85
MISSISSIPPI
Merrill Corporation.............................................. 85
MISSOURI
Midwest Litigation Services.................................85
Jay E. Suddreth & Associates Inc........................ 85
Gene Dolginoff Associates Ltd............................. 85
NEVADA
Depo International............................................... 85
NEW JERSEY
Fitzsimmons.......................................................... 86
Magna Legal Services........................................... 86
Prout & Cammarota............................................. 86
Reporting Associates LLC.................................... 85
NEW MEXICO
Bean & Associates................................................ 86
Kathy Townsend Court Reporters........................ 86
NEW YORK
Capital Area
Associated Reporters Int’l, Inc............................. 86
new york metro area
All-Star Reporters Inc.......................................... 86
DALCO Court Reporting & Legal Video............ 87
Diamond Reporting Inc........................................ 87
Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp................................. 87
Ellen Grauer Court Reporting.............................. 87
Enright Court Reporting Inc................................ 87
Fink & Carney...................................................... 86
Greenhouse Reporting Inc................................... 86
Hudson Reporting Inc.......................................... 87
Jay Deitz & Associates Ltd................................... 86
Lex Reporting Service..........................................87
Suzanne Hand & Associates Inc.......................... 87
Toby Feldman Inc................................................. 86
U.S. Legal Support................................................ 87
Winter Reporting Inc...................................... 87
60 East 42nd Street, Suite 23008
New York, NY 10165
877-953-1414
[email protected]
www.WinterReporting.com
Western
Jack W. Hunt & Associates.................................. 86
Merrill Corporation.............................................. 87
NORTH CAROLINA
A. William Roberts, Jr. & Associates................... 88
Court Reporting Services..................................... 88
Huseby & Associates............................................ 87
COURT REPORTER ACTION LOCATOR
OHIO
cincinnati
Cin-Tel Corporation............................................. 88
Mike Mobley Reporting........................................ 88
Spangler Reporting Services................................. 88
Cleveland
Cady Reporting..................................................... 89
Cefaratti Group.................................................... 88
Mehler & Hagestrom........................................... 88
Mizanin ................................................................88
Parise & Associates Court Reporters................... 89
Columbus
Professional Reporters Inc.............................. 88
398 S. Washington Ave.
Columbus, OH 43215-5542
800-229-0675 • FAX 614-460-5566
e-mail: [email protected]
Celebrating our 20th year!
Runfola Reporters................................................. 88
Toledo
Collins Reporting Service Inc............................... 88
SeaGate Reporting Service Inc............................ 88
OKLAHOMA
Independent Reporting Service Inc..................... 89
Professional Reporters Inc.............................. 89
511 Couch Drive, Suite 100
Oklahoma City, OK 73102
800-376-1006 • FAX 405-272-0559
www.proreporters.com
OREGON
C & C Court Reporting........................................ 88
Naegeli Reporting Corporation............................ 89
PENNSYLVANIA
San Antonio
Federal Court Reporters of San Antonio............. 91
U.S. Legal Support................................................ 91
UTAH
CitiCourt LLC...................................................... 91
Tempest Reporting Inc......................................... 91
Thacker & Co., LLC............................................ 91
VIRGINIA
Tidewater Area
Tayloe Associates Inc...................................... 91
253 West Bute Street
Norfolk, VA 23510
800-828-5928 • FAX 757-461-5454
e-mail: [email protected]
WASHINGTON
Byers & Anderson Inc.......................................... 92
Dean Moburg & Associates................................. 92
Merrill Corporation.............................................. 92
Naegeli Reporting Corporation............................ 92
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COURT REPORTER LISTING
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Minnesota
TE PROG
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800.372.3376
www.merrillcorp.com/law
MERRILL CORPORATION
Missouri
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& Associates
1-800-545-1955
Reporting & Video Services
Serving Minnesota & Western Wisconsin since 1967
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CSR, RPR Reporters • LiveNote/Realtime • Daily Copy
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(952) 922-1955 • Fax: (952) 922-0371
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NEW JERSEY • NEW MEXICO • NEW YORK
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•
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On staff videographers
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Ralph Fink, CSR, RPR
Member of the NCRA All-Star Team (Maritime)
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NEW YORK • NORTH CAROLINA
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DEPO CENTERS: Brooklyn • Manhattan • Queens
Bronx • Staten Island • Mineola • White Plains
Tel: 718-624-7200 • Outside of NY State - 877-624-EBTS
www.diamondreporting.com
New York City Metro
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950 Third Avenue, 5th Floor
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New York, NY 10022
Email: [email protected]
Diamond
M
REPORTING CORP.
• Specialists in Immediate and Daily Copy
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800.325.3376
www.merrillcorp.com/law
MERRILL CORPORATION
North CAROLINA
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NORTH CAROLINA • OHIO
North CAROLINA
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Ohio
Spangler Reporting Services, Inc.
A Full Service Reporting Firm
The Mercantile Center
120 East Fourth Street, Suite 390
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COURT REPORTER LISTING
OHIO • OKLAHOMA • OREGON • PENNSYLVANIA
Ohio
Oregon
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ALLENTOWN • BETHLEHEM • EASTON
GALLAGHER
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Suite 1H • 1600 Lehigh Parkway East
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(610) 439-0504 • Fax (610) 439-0506
Email:[email protected]
• COVERING EASTERN PENNSYLVANIA
• CONFERENCE ROOMS
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TECHNICAL LITIGATION
• COMPREHENSIVE REPORTING SERVICES
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R E P O R T I N G
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www.filius-mclucas.com
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[email protected]
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e-mail
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COURT REPORTER LISTING
PENNSYLVANIA • SOUTH CAROLINA • TENNESSEE • TEXAS
PENNSYLVANIA
James
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Reporting 4%2.
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1880 JFK Blvd., 6th Floor • Philadelphia, PA 19103
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James DeCrescenzo, RDR, CLVS, CSR (NJ)
Certified Realtime Reporter
215-564-3905 • Fax: 215-751-0581
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803.988.0086 • 803.988.0094 Fax • 888.988.0086
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TENNESSEE
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Expert Realtime Reporters
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1616 Walnut St., Suite 300
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TEXAS • UTAH • VIRGINIA
10.28.61.04(MIS) TempestAd2
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AK/RET
REPORTING, INC.
Ginny R. McCluskey
Managing Reporter
E-Mail: [email protected]
Certified Court Reporters
Deposition Suite Available
Suite 880, 555 N. Carancahua
Corpus Christi, TX 78478
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Dallas, Texas 75270
Depositions
Video – Videoconferencing
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Two Deposition Suites
1-800-445-7718 Fax: 214-855-1478
www.uars.net
SAN ANTONIO
D E P O S I TIONS
(est. 1977)
■
■
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deposition suites
■
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transcripts
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service
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TEMPEST REPORTING P.O. Box 3474, Salt Lake City, UT 84110
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24 Hours/7 Days
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Austin
■
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Fax: 512.472.6030
Houston
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E-mail: [email protected]
New York City
■ www.kenowen.com
“Serving the Legal Community for over 45 Years”
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FEDERAL COURT
REPORTERS
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800-388-9037
210-340-6464
800-950-7393
www.fcrsa.com
Airport Center
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Experienced Medical,
78216
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Virginia
Worldwide Court Reporting
Expert Realtime Reporters
Certified Legal Video Specialists
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Complete Litigation Support
Free Deposition Suites
R
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serving
Texas
M
Reporting Services, Inc.
■
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UNITED AMERICAN
Ride the Wave
for all your court
reporting and videoconferencing needs.
Dallas 800.966.4567
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www.merrillcorp.com/law
253 West Bute Street • Norfolk, VA 23510
T 757.461.1984 • F 757.461.5454
MERRILL CORPORATION
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COURT REPORTER LISTING
WASHINGTON • WEST VIRGINIA • WISCONSIN • ASIA
WASHINGTON
SEATTLE/TACOMA
Byers & Anderson, Inc.
Court Reporters/Video/Videoconferencing
Independent Company Serving
Local and National Clients Since 1980
•
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•
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•
Bay View Conference Rooms
Realtime/Livenote
Digital Video/Videoconferencing
Serving All Western Washington
Also Serving Spokane and Yakima Areas
1-800-649-2034
www.byersanderson.com
[email protected]
600 University St., Suite 2300 Seattle, WA 98101-4128
2208 North 30th, Suite 202 Tacoma, WA 98403-3360
Fax (253) 383-4884
West Virginia
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1601 Fifth Avenue
Suite 860
Seattle, WA 98101
[email protected]
!" #" ! Wisconsin
Covering Madison and
Southern Wisconsin
888.892.0392
Fax: 608.833.0682
fortherecordmadison.com
Asia
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Washington
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Expert Realtime Reporters
Certified Legal Video Specialists
Videoconferencing
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Established 1976
For a complete list of services please visit our website :
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92
MADISON & SOUTHERN WISCONSIN
email: [email protected]
On the Capitol Square – One East Main Street
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Fax: 608-256-1306
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M A R C H 2 0 1 0 | JOURNAL FOR THE REPORTING AND CAPTIONING PROFESSIONS | www.NCRAonline.org
Court Reporting and
Litigation Support Services
Throughout Asia
US Depositions • Real-time Reporting
Videography • Interpretation • Arbitrations
Document Management
Hong Kong
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[email protected] [email protected]
tel. +852 2522 1998
tel. +65 6720 0103
fax +852 2522 1575
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CANADA • ENGLAND • WESTERN EUROPE • CERTIFIED LEGAL VIDEO SPECIALIST LISTINGS
COURT REPORTER LISTING
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CANADA
Verbatim Reporters
Depositions
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Our award winning firm specializes in
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+44 (0) 20 7264 2088
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Fax: 011 44 134 283 6656
150 Minories London EC3N 1LS
155 University Ave., Ste. 302, Toronto, ON, Canada M5H 3B7
800.250.9059
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18 Boardrooms + U.S. Depositions + Hearing Rooms
Videotaping + Video Conferencing
www.a-acr.com
E-mail: [email protected]
CALIFORNIA
AN AMERICAN / CANADIAN OWNED AGENCY
Listed in Martindale-Hubbell
REALTIME
Q E-TRANSCRIPTS
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Q
LITIGATION SUPPORT
Q VIDEOTAPE & CONFERENCE ROOMS
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Q
Tel: +44 (0) 14 2056 3636 Fax: +44 (0) 14 2056 1854
Q
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Full Discovery Services
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Video • CLVS
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LONDON OFFICE:
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S.F. • Palo Alto • San Mateo • Sacramento • San Jose • Pacifica
1ST FLOOR, QUALITY HOUSE, 6-9 QUALITY COURT, LONDON WC2A 1HP
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Visit our website:
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s p ecialist
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For all court reporting services
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L I S T I N G S
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C erti f ied
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email: [email protected]
tel: +44 (0) 1225 763485 fax: +44 (0)207 900 1535
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at 800-272-6272 to
advertise in the JCR!
www.mylegal.com................................38
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NCRA PRODUCTS AND SERVICES
Build Your Career ... Join NCRA Today!
You’ll have a long, prosperous career thanks to NCRA’s efforts to position you as the
primary information manager in today’s legal system.
We are your voice on Capitol Hill. We carefully monitor bills, amendments, and grants that may affect the court
reporting and captioning professions — taking action immediately, if needed, through personal Hill visits and grassroots efforts.
Our coordinated, assertive government relations activities include lobbying for more than $12 million in federal
grants to offer realtime writer training to reporters nationwide educating states on the need to require certification or
licensure; and protecting the reputation of court reporters as the trusted guardians of the record by encouraging states
to limit or prohibit third-party contracting arrangements.
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There’s a growing demand for your valuable skills in specialized areas like realtime, captioning, and information
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NCRA offers the most extensive certification programs in the court reporting profession. You’ll get the
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Get the news and information that will keep you connected with your profession, including your
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Save money with deep member discounts on all our career-building products and services.
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Get new clients with your free listing in the Court Reporter Sourcebook!
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Tell your colleagues about NCRA, and ask them to join!
Do you know a reporter, student, scopist, instructor, agency owner or manager, vendor, or other person connected with your
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800-272-NCRA (6272)
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BUILD YOUR CAREER ... JOIN NCRA TODAY!
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, a reporter member of NCRA, hereby certify that
(print name of endorser)
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Date
NOTE: Membership will expire on December 31, 2010. Annual dues payment includes a one-year, $69 subscription to the JCR (Journal of Court Reporting). NCRA dues may
be deductible as an ordinary business expense, but not deductible as a charitable contribution. The non-deductible ordinary business expense portion of your 2010 dues is
1%. CERTIFICATION CANDIDATES (RPR/CBC/CCP): Your membership must be in effect one month prior to the certification registration exam deadline. Not eligible for
this offer: members who haven’t renewed for 2010, members reinstating to retain certification. This membership offer expires March 31, 2010.
SERVING THE REPORTING
AND CAPTIONING
PROFESSIONS
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THE LAST PAGE
What Lawyers Say
Love or Fear?
Who Knows?
Q. So we’re going to help Diane, who amazingly can record all
of us talking at the same time. It’s just amazing what skill she has.
A. I’m quite impressed here.
Q. But we want to make her job easier by just speaking one
person at a time. I can see we’re getting comfortable, and that’s
okay. But we’re just — she’ll take us out in the hall and beat the
snot out of us, I think, if we don’t wait.
Q. Did you know at one time and as you sit here today you just
don’t remember or you never have known?
A. Actually, I don’t know what I did know.
Diane Fattig,
Sacramento, Calif.
Conversion Calculators
Q. If she weighed approximately 1,378 pounds, would that put
her into the very low birth weight category?
A. I believe you mean grams.
Q. Grams. I would hope she didn’t weigh that much.
Joni Fleig, RPR
Washington, Iowa
Oxymoron Alert!
MR. ATTORNEY: Don’t let the fact that this is a drug case upset you. Please, look at it like he’s been charged with theft, something that we Midwesterners can accept as a, quote, decent crime.
Rita Corson, RMR, CRR
Rushville, Ill.
Keeping It Under Control
Q. Okay. And did you start that job relatively soon after leaving the sheriff’s office here?
A. I had two months where I was working with Orkin Pest
Control, and then the department of corrections called me and I
started with them.
Q. Similar jobs?
A. Yeah.
Leeann Keenan, RMR, CRR
Breckenridge, Colo.
Tangled Tongue Syndrome
Q. As a deponent, you had the right to get a copy of the transcript and review it. We usually give people 30 days or you can
waive it.
A. Yeah, I’d like one now.
Q. You would?
A. Yeah, just because I’ve seen things in the past get misinterpertated (sic).
Amy Trevino, RPR
Reno, Nev.
Pop Quiz
Q. Do you know what the population is?
A. Of Cocke County?
Q. Yes, sir.
A. 37,000.
Q. Do you know how many hospitals they have there?
A. One.
Q. Do you know how many ER doctors are on staff there?
A. Fourteen.
Q. Do you know how many beds they have there?
A. About 85.
Q. Do you know how many beds the University of Tennessee
hospital has?
A. Hundreds, but I couldn’t tell you. Probably seven.
Q. How many hospitals are in Knoxville?
A. Probably about 14. No, probably about 10.
Q. Do you know the population of — of Knoxville?
A. Metropolitan area probably has about 750,000.
Q. Do you know the team colors of the University of Tennessee
football team?
A. No. I know the — I know the Rocky Top song, though.
Orange and white.
Laurel Eiler, RDR
Brentwood, Tenn.
If It Walks Like a Duck…
Pro se defendant examining his girlfriend during his trial.
Q. Do I look like a criminal to you?
A. Yeah.
Q. But am I a criminal?
A. No. But you sure look like one.
Mr. Fields: No further questions, man.
The Court: Okay. Anything else?
Mr. Weeks: No, your Honor.
The Witness: He does.
Of course, her answers were met with laughter from the jury and
everyone else in the courtroom.
Michele L. Fontaine, RPR
Leicester, Mass.
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Raleigh, N.C.
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