Realtime Reporting and Broadcast Captioning

Have you ever wondered where all those captions come from that scroll across your television screen? Have you ever been in a courtroom and observed a man or woman, sitting in front of the judge's bench, tapping quietly on a small machine? What about deaf or hard-of-hearing individuals who want to go to school with everybody else? These are all examples of situations that involve men and women writing on special electronic stenotype machines to capture information and convert it into digital and readable form for judicial proceedings, conventions, medical transcription services, and educational institutions.

According to the National Court Reporters Association (NCRA), there are at least six major occupational areas in which individuals with machine shorthand skills are employed. They are:

Judicial Reporting — The largest area of employment, these reporters take records of court proceedings, depositions, and administrative hearings. The cases may be controversial and highly publicized, like criminal trials, millionaire divorces, government corruption trials, and lawsuits against everyone from movie stars to elected officials to professional athletes.

Broadcast Captioning — These reporters provide the captions that are seen scrolling across the top or bottom of your television screen.

Rules issued by the Federal Communications Commission require that, by 2006, all new TV programming be captioned. An offshoot of closed captioning has enabled court reporters to work as captioned radio experts, using their technology to simulcast talk shows, news, and sports onto the Internet or an online service. This is a growing field, with skilled writers in high demand.

Communications Access Realtime Reporting (CART) — These reporters provide specialized services to deaf and hard-of-hearing people. They may attend classes and translate the lectures and classroom discussions into readable text so students with hearing problems can follow and participate. These reporters also provide services for deaf and hard-of-hearing people in churches, weddings, business settings, doctors' offices, and anywhere there is a need for communication access.

Webcasting and Reporting to the Internet — Because of a growth in online conferences, reporters have found their services in demand on the Internet. Realtime reporting is provided for sales meetings, press conferences, product introductions, and technical training seminars. These proceedings can be instantly transmitted to all parties involved, via computers. As participants speak into telephones or microphones, a court reporter translates their words in realtime. The words appear on everyone's computers, accompanied by any relevant documents or graphics.

Scopists — These individuals are hired by judicial reporters to edit and proofread transcripts while the reporters work in court or take depositions. A scopist takes a rough copy of the proceeding—whether it is on disk, has been sent as an e-mail file, or is simultaneously displayed on a computer connected to the court reporter's machine—and reads the stenotype-to-English translation to check for "mistranslates," which are homonyms (their instead of there or they're) or other words such as proper names or technical terms that were not in the court reporter's computer dictionary. Scopists edit the transcript to ensure it is in the requested formats and send the transcript back to the court reporter for a final review.

Rapid Data Entry — Hospitals, insurance companies, and other businesses have mounds of data that need to be entered into their computer systems. Using the stenotype for word processing is much faster than normal typing. Trained court reporters can input text at 200 words per minute, as opposed to 100 words per minute for a fast typist.

How does one receive training for these wonderful occupations?
First of all, a prospective student should be intelligent, disciplined, motivated, computer-literate, and have above-average language skills. Court reporting students also need to be able to meet deadlines, work well under pressure, and concentrate for long periods of time. The training for these careers requires two to four years. To work as a judicial reporter in Illinois, an individual must be licensed. Opportunities for licensing exams are given approximately five times per year. A student should attend a school that is accredited by the National Court Reporters Association. Most approved schools offer associate degree and certificate programs.

How much can one expect to earn as a realtime reporter or broadcast captioner?
The income varies depending on the type of reporting jobs and experience of the individual reporter. The average income for judicial reporters is about $62,000. Earning potential is limited only by the amount of time reporters are willing to work. Official court reporters earn a salary and a per-page fee for transcripts. Deposition reporters are paid per job and receive a per-page fee for transcripts.

Broadcast captioners earn a salary and typically can receive from $35,000 to $75,000 per year, depending on experience and the number of hours worked.

CART reporters can earn between $35,000 to $65,000 per year.

Editorial provided by Peg Sokalski, CRI, from Career Colleges of Chicago.