Volunteer for CCHI

For each panel of SMEs that participate in a specific test development activity, CCHI strives to ensure diversity based on a number of demographic and professional factors including:

• Geography – diversity by areas of the U.S.;
• Gender;
• Age;
• Education;
• Race and ethnicity (including country of origin for non-U.S. born SMEs in order to represent cultural diversity and regional variants of the same language which is especially important for languages spoken in many countries, such as Spanish, Arabic, etc.);
• Languages in which SMEs interpret, including various regional variants;
• Language acquisition background – native speakers, non-native speakers, and heritage speakers;
• Level of education specific to healthcare interpreting
• Interpreting modality –in-person, telephonic (OPI), remote video (VRI);
• Employment status and role within the healthcare industry (employee or freelancer; practicing interpreter, manager, educator, bilingual healthcare provider, translator);
• Years of experience in healthcare interpreting;
• Frequency of interpreting in healthcare settings;
• Practice setting – hospital, physician practice, outpatient clinic, home care, public health, health plan/insurer;
• Strength in specific interpreting skills and knowledge areas;
• Additional relevant experience (e.g. as court or conference interpreter, translator, healthcare professional, foreign language instructor, etc.).

SMEs may participate in more than one panel so that they can help inform new SMEs of the prior work and answer any questions that may arise. However, CCHI strives to have at least two-thirds of panelists for each activity or project to be new or non-involved in other test development activities or project to allow for a broader representation of the profession.

All CCHI’s SMEs must meet the following minimum required prerequisites:

• Minimum age of 18 years.
• At least one year of experience working as a healthcare interpreter* as one of the following:
  • Staff – working in a full- or part-time (minimum .5 FTE) position (at a healthcare facility/provider or working for a language services agency)
  • Freelance – the majority of interpreting work must be healthcare-related.

(*This requirement may be waived by CCHI’s TDSC for SMEs representing stakeholders who are not practicing interpreters, e.g. supervisors, university faculty members, interpreters certified in other specialties (e.g. court), healthcare providers, and regulators, whose expertise is important for the validity and quality of the examination.)

• If a practicing healthcare interpreter – be a CoreCHI™ certificant**, or – for languages in which the CHI™ certification exists – be a CHI™ certificant**

(**This requirement may be waived by CCHI’s TDSC for projects/activities not related to item writing, reviewing or rating if such waiver contributes to the panel diversity or enhances the scope of the project/activity).) If SME is a practicing interpreter of another specialty (e.g. court), SME must have a minimal certification existing for that specialty in their language.

• Have a minimum of U.S. high school diploma (or GED) or its equivalent from another country.  (A bachelor-level degree is preferred.)
• Have at least 40 hours of healthcare interpreter training. (A college-level specialization in healthcare interpreting is preferred.)
• Have linguistic proficiency in English and the language of interpreting at the professional level.
• Cannot be a CCHI Commissioner at the time of the project/activity.
• Not currently involved in educational programs of healthcare interpreters leading to initial certification (or expected to be involved throughout the term of engagement with CCHI as an SME). CCHI recognizes that the pool of SMEs in certain languages is limited, therefore, TDSC may modify this requirement as follows: If the SME is involved in educational programs of healthcare interpreters leading to initial certification during the SME engagement with CCHI or any time afterwards, the SME must agree not to utilize information received as an SME to adapt an educational program to help candidates prepare for CCHI’s examination.

Thank you, everyone, who applied to become an SME to participate in the CHI™ test development activities! We selected a strong group of Arabic certified interpreters for the project.

Thank you for your interest and support!

The Certification Commission for Healthcare Interpreters is opening nominations for the two Commissioner positions for the term from October 25, 2018 to October 24, 2021.

Nominees must represent a stakeholder group of the healthcare interpreting profession, healthcare interpreting industry, or field of language access to health care.

Before nominating, please review the expectations of the CCHI Commissioner and the criteria for selecting Commissioners. Also please read CCHI Policies for Commissioners at http://cchicertification.org/uploads/CCHI_Policies_for_Commissioners.pdf.

You may nominate yourself or someone else. If you nominate someone, prior to submission of the nomination, that individual must agree to the nomination and to serve for a term of three (3) years.

Nominations must be submitted on the Nomination Form (click the button below to download) as an attachment via email with the subject “CCHI Commissioner nomination” by 8:00 p.m. EDT on August 16, 2018 to: solutions@cchicertification.org.