FAQ

1993 ATIO AWARD

ATIO congratulates Liliane Vincent, first winner of the ATIO Award 1993.

Ms. Liliane Vincent, Head, Linguistics Services, Canadian Teachers' Federation, set up a translation department at the Canadian Teachers' Federation, then assisted in establishing the Language Services of the Canada Post Corporation. She is also Founding President of the Network of Translators in Education, which is made up of over 60 language professionals representing 35 employers.

1994 ATIO AWARD

ATIO is honoured to present its 1994 Award to Bryna Monson - a pioneer of community interpretation in Canada.

Ms. Monson is the founder and Executive Director of the Family & Patient Communication Centre of Ottawa, a non-profit community interpretation agency. It provides volunteer comunity interpreters to public-service institutions when they need to communicate with clients in other languages than English or French. Ms. Monson established the agency in 1979, more than a decade before anyone else thought of the need for this essential service.

1995 ATIO AWARD

ATIO is honoured to present its 1995 Award to Richard Fidler and Julien Marquis, pioneers of the language professions in Canada.

In granting the 1995 ATIO Award to Richard Fidler and Julien Marquis, the Selection Committee wishes to acknowledge the leadership and efforts of these two ardent promoters of the language professions. Indeed, their work resulted in the recognition of language professionals by the government of Ontario.

Professional recognition, obtained in 1989, marks an important step in the individual and collective development of ATIO members. All holders of the certified title and all those who seek certification are grateful to them for their initiative and commitment.

1996 ATIO AWARD

ATIO is honoured to present the 1996 ATIO Award to Termium® on CD-ROM, the Government of Canada Linguistic Data Bank, a product of the Translation Bureau.

Language professionals need ready access to terminology tools that keep pace with new developments in language.

Termium® on CD-ROM is just such a tool. It offers high-quality terminology in a wide variety of fields and some 100,000 new terms are added each year.

For many language professionals, Termium® on CD-ROM has become a constant companion. It is only fitting, then, that ATIO should celebrate its 75th anniversary by bestowing the 1996 ATIO Award on the people behind the product. Congratulations to the Termium Team!

1997 ATIO AWARD

ATIO is honoured to present the 1997 ATIO Award to Entraide Traduction Santé (ETS), a network of translators supporting health care and services.

Established in March 1984, Entraide Traduction Santé, more commonly known as "ETS", is a group of language professionals scattered around Ontario and involved in the sectors: public health, hospitals, professional health associations and volunteer organizations. The members discuss translation and terminology problems and standardize terms to be used. In awarding it the prize, ATIO wishes to give recognition to the efforts ETS has made to harmonize communication among health care providers in Ontario and with their counterparts in the other provinces and territories.

1998 ATIO AWARD

Translation firms in Ontario began quietly, but they have gradually established themselves to the point where they now compel recognition as useful, essential contributors to society. Starting out as one-person operations, they have expanded over the years as partnerships multiplied in line with geometric growth in production capacity, sales and jobs created.

Recognized for their quality all across Ontario, they have proven themselves capable of enabling the business world to communicate clearly and accurately with its customers as much in Canada's official languages as in the languages of its new citizens.

It is, therefore, the advent of translation firms in Ontario and their provision of quality services to the people of Ontario which the Association of Translators and Interpreters of Ontario wishes to recognize by awarding them the ATIO Award 1998.

The following individuals symbolically accepted the ATIO Award 1998 on behalf of all translation firms in their regions:

For the Ottawa region, Philippe Tessier, founder and president of Les Traductions Tessier S.C.C., Tessier Translations Corporation.
For the Toronto region, Charles Metz, from the firm, Holt French Translating Bureau Ltd.
For the Northern Ontario region, Françoise Michot and John Arbuckle, founders and partners of the firm, Language Services/Services linguistiques.

It is ATIO's express wish that all translation firms in Ontario remain an active presence in their respective communities.

1999 ATIO AWARD

By selecting the University of Ottawa's School of Translation and Interpretation as the recipient of the 1999 ATIO Award, ATIO is pleased to highlight the excellent quality of the courses taught by the School, and especially the quality of its leadership over the past 20 years under the guidance of Directors Brian Harris, Roda Roberts, Annie Brisset and Geneviève Mareschal.

The nomination for the Award was signed by former students and former and current instructors at the School. All cite the spirit that prevails in the School, the quality of the Directors' contribution, the help they have provided in updating the curriculum, creating the co-op program and the exchange and mentoring programs, and adapting course content to the needs of the market. They also praised the quality of the job placements organized by the staff and the assistance that these directors have provided graduates in finding a first job.

Dr. Geneviève Mareschal, the current Director, and her predecessors, Drs. Annie Brisset and Roda Roberts, received the Award presented during the International Translation Day celebrations in the Ottawa region. As a thank you note, Dr. Roberts read the message from Brian Harris, teaching for a year in Spain at the University of Valladolid.

2000 ATIO AWARD

Ministry of the Attorney General
Court Interpretation and Translation Services

Ministère du Procureur général
Service d'interprétation et de traduction judiciaires

The 2000 ATIO Award has been conferred on the Ministry of the Attorney General of Ontario for its role in establishing a court interpreter accreditation system in the province.

Beginning in 1985, the Ministry initiated the development of a testing model to evaluate the linguistic knowledge and interpretation ability of interpreter candidates. That flexible, innovative model was eventually applied to some 50 languages and allowed the Ministry to create a registry of court interpreters that now includes roughly 1,000 interpreters across the province.

In addition, the Ministry developed various orientation and professional development tools for its accredited court interpreters, including training sessions and well-regarded bilingual glossaries.

That pioneering initiative was a significant step forward in the provision of interpretation services to users of the courts in Ontario and formed the basis for future progress in this field.

This marks the first time the ATIO Award is granted to a recipient in the area of court interpretation. Ms. Heather Cooper, Assistant Deputy Attorney General of Ontario received the honour for the Ministry during the International Translation Day celebrations in Toronto.

2001 ATIO AWARD

2001 ATIO Award Presentation Speech,
September 28, 2001
Toronto, JK ROM, The Dining Room of the Royal Ontario Museum
by Hélène Gélinas-Surprenant, C. Term., C. Tran.
and Kenneth Larose, C. Tran.
Representatives of professional associations, colleges and universities, and translation, interpretation and terminology firms

Dear guests and friends of the Association,

80 years already! Today, ATIO members are pausing to reflect upon the Association's many accomplishments enshrined in our history: the creation of the Association itself, the institution of the Canadian Translators and Interpreters Council (CTIC) standardized examination, and perhaps the greatest milestone, the passage of the 1989 ATIO Act, which is still having an impact today.

In recent years, ATIO has undergone many exciting changes designed to ensure greater recognition of our members' professional skills and experience. We have established methods and procedures for membership through recognition on dossier to allow experienced professionals to be granted the title of member without having to sit the standardized CTIC examination.

As well, since last year, it has been possible for certified translators, conference interpreters, court interpreters and terminologists to use a pan-Canadian title in addition to or instead of their provincial title when working for an international agency, or working or sending work outside the country. In addition, long-standing experienced members can now have their field(s) of specialization officially recognized and registered, and use them in advertising.

The Association is also committed to helping students, who are the future of our professions. For example, it will soon be possible for new graduates in translation or interpretation to become members much more quickly by registering in the mentorship programme and building up a dossier.

But we also want to reach out to our future colleagues as they pursue their studies. The ATIO Foundation is a key vehicle for achievination aw

In all these developments and achievements, one member's name keeps cropping up. This name is very familiar, since it is so easy to become accustomed to excellence! Its constant proximity can sometimes blind us to its presence among us. This year, the ATIO Award recognizes Pascal Sabourin

2002 ATIO AWARD

By: Hélène Gélinas-Surprenant, C.Tran., C. Term.
President of the 2002 ATIO Award committee
Translation: Victor Loewen, C. Tran.

Behind every great achievement stands an enterprising person with original ideas and a passion for making them reality, who succeeds by dint of effort and doses of ingenuity. Our 2002 award recipient, Philippe Tessier, is this kind of person. Our professions owe him recognition for his years of excellence as a professional, an administrator, an originator of ideas and a motivator.

He was a source of inspiration behind the creation of the Terminology service of the Translation Bureau. When he moved on to found his own company in 1980, he left behind a service brimming with promise that would achieve fruition in the coming years. He first gained renown as a freelance translator, and then, as his success grew, as manager of Tessier Translations a firm specializing in English-to-French translation. As a businessman, he provided his language professionals with all the guidance, structure, and support necessary for producing texts of the only brand of quality he knows: excellence. For more than twenty years now, Philippe Tessier has been at the head of a company of true professionals, among whom he personifies precision and skill, two essential qualities for practising translation consistent with professional standards.

We also cannot overlook his contribution to the labour force, as he has influenced translation professionals and technicians by way of example, as a master of his craft, a stalwart for organization, and a model of perseverance-someone for whom a job well done and done on time is the only way to satisfy clients, who, by the way, after these many years of faithful service, are still loyal to him.

What Philippe was to his business he was also to his professional association: participant, speaker or sponsor. He attended every meeting, every convention, and every training workshop.

In 2000, at the suggestion of the President of the ATIO Foundation, he accepted, as President of Tessier Translations, the challenge of creating a bursary for promising young translators who would benefit from a scholarship and a paid summer placement during their final two years of studies in translation, followed by an offer of a permanent position after graduation and two years of probation. This innovative way of encouraging the rising generation of language professionals is proving to be the way of the future for firms that, regardless of their size, wish to contribute to the training of new recruits while securing a choice employee. The very first Mélanie Tessier Memorial Scholarship was awarded last year, and the second will be awarded in the coming months to a budding translator who incarnates, as did the award's namesake, our expectations for excellence.

For all these reasons, ATIO is proud to bestow the 2002 ATIO Award to Philippe Tessier. While we have had opportunity in the past to recognize his achievements, today it is the man we wish to honour and thank. The Award is now given to him by last year's recipient, founder of FondATIO, and another "brewer of good ideas," Pascal Sabourin. We heartily congratulate Philippe for this highly deserved honour!

2003 ATIO AWARD

Spotlight on Terminology

By: The ATIO Award Committee “The smallest in number of ATIO’s professions, but with an influence that belies its size”: thus was terminology described in remarks by Fabrice Cadieux, then–President of ATIO, at the official ATIO Award ceremony last March. Indeed, this is the second ATIO Award to be given for an achievement in terminology.

Along with the groundbreaking work of those pioneers who conceived, created and implemented Onterm, the Ontario Government’s official terminology resource, the Association is saluting the contribution of terminologists to the lives of all language professionals.

Already, in 1996 the ATIO Award was dedicated to Termium, the federal Translation Bureau’s terminology data bank. Once again, the Association is saluting with its highest honour the contribution of terminologists to “the rest of us,” to the quality and authoritativeness of our work.

As you can see in our photo, and not surprisingly, the award-winning Onterm team is made up of experienced, well-known professionals, including many members of the Association, who work in addition for a long-time partner of ATIO (and breeding ground for Association leaders), the Ontario Government Translation Service.

Congratulations once again to the Onterm team members, to their colleagues in the Ontario government, and to all our terminologist members. You have served our professions well and we hope that your translator and interpreter colleagues, as well as the public, can benefit from your contributions for many years to come.
Photo: Denis Perreault
Talia, a new arrival at the Terminology Unit, with her friends in the Terminology Unit, Government Translation Service (GTS) of Ontario: Hagit Fry, Isabelle Bauman, Christine Ahmed, Nelly Hakim, Philip Metz, Denis Perreault, Nelida Chan, Edna Hussman, Sheila Tracey

2004 ATIO AWARD

Dear professional colleagues,

Thank you for honouring me with the 2004 ATIO Award. Over my fifteen years on the Board of Directors I have seen the Association grow, with membership numbers rising annually and the constituent professions going from two to four, and the increasing quality and excellence of the Secretariat in providing the services members request.

I think of the colleagues with whom I shared concerns as administrators and worked with to find solutions. Whether it was the Board of Directors of ATIO or of FondATIO, the ATIO Awards Committee or the Foundation’s Scholarships and Awards Committee, the Recognition and Certification Committee or the Mélanie Tessier Scholarship Committee, I was working with first-rate people who had the best interests of our professions and their future at heart. Together we worked to find ways our professional association could best serve the professions we practise so that they are better known and respected.

As for you, beloved By-laws, you took up my time and energy to such an extent that you are surely part of the reason I have been honoured – amended twice, completely corrected on two occasions, rewritten three times, and re-read I don’t know how many times in eleven years – you demonstrate the vitality of a rapidly developing association which, since the Association of Translators and Interpreters Act was passed in 1989, has welcomed terminologists and legal interpreters to its ranks, adopted procedures for certification on dossier and recognition of specialties, and provided mechanisms to unite the diversity of languages and cultures in the Association, while keeping a close eye on the language industry and the exercise of our professions in Canada.

I acquired the desire to learn about things and a sense of sharing from my father, whom I saw always heading up organizations of a social nature. From my mother, I got my sense of organization and some of her creativity. I thank them for providing me a shining example, and I thank ATIO for allowing me to participate in furthering its development over the long term.

To those with whom I have worked, I express my great appreciation and thanks; we can be proud that we were able to be a part of the Association’s dynamic growth.

To the Association, long may you continue. I had to delay my vacation because of a professional assignment, so I will not be with you on September 30 to receive the Award, but I wish to express my sincere appreciation for this honour.

With deepest thanks,

Hélène Gélinas-Surprenant, C. Tran., C. Term. (Canada)

2005 ATIO AWARD

It is with great pleasure that I accepted this year to present the ATIO Award for 2005. As you may know, the ATIO Award is granted every year on International Translation Day. The award was created to highlight and reward initiatives that contribute to the development of language-related professions.

Nominees do not have to be members of ATIO but must practise one of the Association's constituent professions. This year, the recipient is an ATIO member. A certified, English-French translator with his own business, he has been a member of the Association since 1989. He is Michel Trahan. Michel has contributed greatly to the Association over the years.

If you have attended any of the Association’s annual general meetings since 1995, you have probably seen Michel hard at work, taking the minutes of the meeting. In fact, he has been the Association’s secretary for 8 of the past 10 years. Between 1995 and 1997, Michel held the position of a secretary-treasurer. He therefore fulfilled the functions of secretary and treasurer. He was secretary in 1998 and in 1999 and again between 2002 and 2004. As if this wasn’t enough, Michel was also the CTTIC secretary for two years. In fact, he is still secretary for the FondATIO, the program that offers financial support to students completing a university program in translation or interpretation in Ontario. Michel has been its secretary for more than five years.

A former colleague on the board of directors described Michel as a straight-talker who was very efficient and with whom the other board members enjoyed working.

On behalf of ATIO, I would like to say thank you, Michel, for your hard work and your dedication to the Association.

2006 ATIO AWARD

Dear Colleagues,

I am very honoured to receive the ATIO Award. During my 32 years in translation, I have witnessed and benefitted from our Association’s ongoing efforts to further our profession. I have had the opportunity to get to know many language professionals and gain from their exceptional skills and extensive knowledge. During my 10 years in the pharmaceutical industry, in particular, I had the privilege of working with some remarkable translators in the Translation Group – Rx&D. Together, we worked to improve the French-language communications of our respective companies through such activities as the terminology bulletin Pharmaterm, regular discussions, and training sessions. My time at Janssen-Ortho was an outstanding professional experience, particularly because of the wonderful team within Linguistic Services and the high calibre of this company. It would be difficult for me to imagine a more rewarding career.

I wish ATIO continued success and further achievements in its efforts to advance our profession.

Alain Côté, C. Tran. (Canada)
Translation Victoria Ralph, C. Tran. (Canada)

HONORARY MEMBERS

• Jean Darbelnet
• Clarence Parsons
• Jean Poirier
• André Séguinot
• Jean-Paul Vinay