Program History
Recognizing the deficit of formally trained health care interpreters, related training programs, and community standards, National Linguistic & Cultural Programs embarked on a journey to build the capacity of qualified health care interpreters in the workplace and community.
Kaiser Permanente initiated the design of a model health care interpreting curriculum in 1996 in collaboration with the City College of San Francisco (CCSF) Health Science Department. The partnership successfully expanded the curriculum into a formal health care interpreter training program in a dual academic and health care setting.
The HCI curriculum is based on what are considered crucial elements in meeting Kaiser Permanente's standards of care and what CCSF considers essential academic standards for its constituents. Due to the College Board's immediate recognition of the program's academic relevance, the effort evolved into a formal 15-unit Health Care Interpreter Certificate Program, making CCSF the first educational institution in the Western United States to offer health care interpreter training at the college-level and the longest sustained health care interpreter training program in the United States. The program is aimed at enhancing students' knowledge, skills, and experiences as well as preparing them for successful employment in the health care industry.
In the summer of 2001, faculty members from six California community colleges convened for an intensive HCI Instructor Training Summer Institute at Kaiser Permanente to learn how to implement the HCI model program. Following the Summer Institute, one of the attending colleges, Southern California's Mt. San Antonio, immediately implemented the program, graduating its first class in June 2002. Majority of the HCI graduates found immediate employment in the health care industry. Reedley College also implemented the HCI program and graduated its first class in December of 2002.
In Spring 2004, NLCP held its second HCI Instructor Training Institute to disseminate the model program nationally. Participants of the Training Institute included several colleges and ten Hablamos Juntos' partnering demonstration sites.
Since that time, several HCI Instructor Training Institutes have been held to disseminate the program further. This Training Institute is provided free of charge to our partnering educational institutions’ faculty and KP sites’ leadership. Participants are responsible for their own travel expenses.
Over the years, the HCI model program has been successfully replicated in other parts of California (through funding provided by The California Endowment). Furthermore, NLCP has extending the reach of the model across the nation through a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation grant. Learn more under our Partnership section.