Market-Based Education For Master Of Translation And Interpreting (MTI) Students

In the wake of the desperate need for talents in translation and interpretingmarket, China has been intensifying its effort on translator and interpreter training.Therefore, Master of Translation and Interpreting (MTI), a newly established masterdegree specializing in training translator and interpreter, sprung into being andwitnessed a rapid development. However, it seems that the relevant market has notbeen blessed with the boon and the thirst for qualifying translators and interpretersremains unquenched. This paper conjectures that the low quality in training MTI is toblame for the unquenched thirst in the market in spite of the increased number ofMTI schools and graduates. As a result, how to improve the quality of MTI traininghas become a focus in the academia. Most of the relevant researches seekpedagogical approaches instead of a marked-based approach. To fill the researchvacuum and confirm the above conjecture, this paper tentatively seeks themarked-based approach by way of a market survey to explore the methods ofimproving the quality of MTI training, in the hope that the market perspective is ableto provide a series of feasible and effective suggestions on MTI training.The process of the market survey is arduous, but the highly valuable results arewell worth the effort. The survey confirms the conjecture and inspires new ideas forthe paper. Based on the analysis of the survey, this paper argues in detail for theproposed ways of improving the MTI training quality, including a. raising theprofessionalism in MTI training; b. considering the opportunity costs in respect of thestudents, the market and the training schools; c. paving the road to career successfor students. The three proposals cover aspects of perfecting teaching force,designing curriculum, after-class training workshop, assessment before and afterenrollment, moral hazard in MTI training and internship.This paper seeks an innovative and unique new approach, i.e. a market-basedapproach, to advise the MTI training improvement, which not only demonstrates theimportance of market to MTI training but also sheds light on a new researchdirection concerning the amelioration of MTI training.