Clark State Community College will celebrate National Court Reporting & Captioning Week February 11 - 18. Clark State has teamed with local captioner Sue Terry to caption the theatrical presentation of Guys and Dolls at Kenton Ridge High School in Springfield. The event will be held at 1 p.m., Saturday, February 18.

“Sue is the epitome of a professional in this awesome career field, having provided her services in a multitude of venues, including U.S. presidential debates, high-profile legal cases, conventions and college courses,” explains Robyn Hennigan, Judicial Court Reporting (JCR) program coordinator and assistant professor at Clark State. “Her career certainly showcases the opportunities available in the rewarding and lucrative career the JCR degree from Clark State affords.”

Clark State’s Judicial Court Reporting program is in partnership with Stark State College and offers a completely online associate degree option in court reporting, with an additional semester offering of a career-enhancement certificate for captioning. 

“Court reporting and captioning entails learning to write a realtime theory on a stenographic writing machine at speeds of 225 words per minute (wpm) in testimony (two-voice) dictation, 200 wpm in literary dictation and 180 wpm in jury charge dictation at a minimum of 95 percent accuracy to provide instantaneous translation of the spoken word,” explained Hennigan.

Students are trained toward obtaining the National Court Reporters Association's (NCRA) Registered Professional Reporter (RPR) certification upon graduation with encouragement of obtaining NCRA's Certified Realtime Reporter certification after obtaining their RPR.

“The field of realtime reporting is an exciting, vital and rewarding career field offering a multitude of varying opportunities to employ realtime skills, from taking a verbatim record in the courtroom, in depositions and in hearings, to captioning local, state and national news and sporting events like the Super Bowl, World Series and the Olympics, along with many other live programming options,” said Hennigan.

“It's a high-paying career option where opportunities are abundant and life-long learning is at the forefront.”