Information Reporting Technology (IRT)

Reporting has joined the ranks of the IT professions because computers are an integral part of information reporting.

Information reporters are using their knowledge and skill to serve as information managers in complicated trials. Freelance reporters now have the ability to capture their deposition in digital format. A broadcast captioner can assist millions of deaf and hard-of-hearing persons by captioning television and news programs. Education reporters are assisting students who are hearing-impaired through the use of realtime technology. Realtime transcriptionists who develop the ability to use the shorthand machine as the input device for text entry are availing themselves of a multitude of job opportunities. Webcast reporters are reporters who have found their services in demand providing realtime reporting to the Internet in a new field where sales meetings, press conferences, product introductions and technical training seminars are instantly transmitted to all parties involved via computers. A scopist is one who edits transcripts with computer-aided transcription software into English, correcting mistranslates/untranslates and employing proper punctuation, English, and formatting to the official court transcript and/or deposition. Scopists can work as independent contractors from their home or work for a freelance reporting firm.

Court reporters, including deposition reporters and broadcast captioners, earn an average of more than $64,000 a year. The U.S. Department of Labor projects that court reporting job opportunities will grow faster than the average for all occupations through 2016. Captioning of live television programs is done by specially trained court reporters called broadcast captioners. Federal rules require captioning of hundreds of hours of live programming each week, creating a surge in career opportunities for people with the right skills. About 27% of the court reporters in the United States actually work in court. The majority are freelance reporters hired by attorneys to create verbatim transcripts of pretrial depositions of potential trial witnesses. Some reporters use a form of captioning to provide more personalized services for people who are deaf or hard-of-hearing through Communication Access Realtime Translation. CART reporters accompany deaf clients as needed - for example, to college classes - to provide instant conversion of speech into text. Reporting companies that provide this service cannot meet the demand.

Stark State College of Technology offers state-of-the-art technology, computer-aided instruction (CAI), and computer-aided transcription (CAT) training, which provide students with hands-on realtime writing experience and an extensive, conflict-free StenEd theory personal dictionary, equipping the students for realtime reporting and preparing them for today’s sophisticated reporting careers. The students write realtime to computers from the first week of class until graduation, preparing them for the sophisticated career of realtime reporting. During the educational process, students create and maintain captioning/judicial stenotype writing dictionaries, as well as the StenEd main dictionary.

Captioning, an option in the information reporting technologies program, is the outgrowth of the court reporting field and is a highly developed skill that is used to translate spoken communication into visual communication. A stenotype machine is connected to a state-of-the-art computer with special
closed-captioning software that allows the writer to caption the spoken word in various TV/news programs, classrooms, conventions, and conferences. VITAC Corporation, a leading captioning company nationwide, is partnering with Stark State to provide the software, educational, and technical support. Stark State is presently a training site for VITAC Corporation for transitional reporters currently in the field seeking a career change to captioning. Stark State also conducts yearly captioning seminars in conjunction with VITAC Corporation.

The information reporting technologies program offers the entire program through traditional classes and through E-learning. E-Learning is a unique alternative to traditional on-campus courses. It affords students the opportunity to learn with flexibility of time and place while maintaining access to faculty and other College services. Stark State College offers nationally accredited online degrees, certificates and more than 130 online courses.

The goal is that graduates will demonstrate the use of good grammar, punctuation and editing skills for transcription preparation and production; conduct research and realtime writing dictionary maintenance for broadcast reporting; communicate clearly and concisely; utilize all information reporting technology; exemplify a high standard of ethics as an information reporting professional and demonstrate employability skills and characteristics as an information reporting professional.

Graduation Stenotype Speed Requirements

Judicial Reporting
Three 5-minute 2-voice testimony tests, three 5-minute jury charge tests, and three 5-minute literary tests must be passed with a minimum of 95% accuracy; and transcribe a simulated state certification test, state qualifying exam, or RPR skills test within the allotted test transcription guidelines.

Captioning
Three (3) fifteen-minute, literary broadcast material tests at 180 wpm (word count) must be passed with 96% verbatim accuracy following NCRA’s “What is an Error Guidelines,” (the instructor will grade a random five-minute selection from each fifteen minute take); and submit an unedited realtime captioned translation of three (3) 15-minute program segments on varied topics.