By Shaifali Khulbe
Modlingua Learning Pvt. Ltd, New Delhi, India, founded by Ravi Kumar is a leading translation company certified by ISO 9001:2008 that provides certified translation services.
This summer they organised an internship program for language students in order to help them grow into professional translators and interpreters. We worked through online communication by having virtual classes and online meetings through the application called GOMeeting. The weekly scheduled classes focused on particular areas such as Project Management, professional translation, quality standards of translation, etc. The classes were followed by assignments based on the subject of discussion in the preceding class.
The very first class was the introductory class where we were familiarized with the plan of the intership, how it would proceed and what was to be expected from it. This was followed by our first aassignment which was to create our own profiles on the company's website in order to publish our upcoming articles on the site.
The second assignment was followed by the second meeting where we learned about the importance of networking in the translation industry. The questions for the assignment were intelligently formed using images and analysis on wolf pack strategy and networking among ants so as to actually make the interns understand the nature and importance of networking.
The third assignment focused on the Google Search Engine, relationship between Content writing, Online Marketing, etc. Based on the online lecture we had to write about our own understanding of any one of the topics.
Assignment four followed a conference along with a guest lecture from Prof. Ioanna about entrepreneurship and personal branding for translators. Thus the assignment was to write on any one of the topics like Personal Branding, Client services, Freelancing, Entrepreneurship, etc.
The fifth assignment was based on the quality standards of translation providing a deeper insight into the professional world of translation. The very last assignment following the last meeting was on Project Management and getting familiar with its various aspects.
Overall, the online meetings helped the interns to learn about the professional world of translation and the assignments that followed helped us develop our own knowledge and thoughts on the learnt topics. This methodology I found particularly interesting and personally helped me a lot in understanding role and importance of a language professional in the society. Along with that, they helped me learn about the various skills required to become a successful language professional.
The various videos uploaded on the Youtube channel of the organization helped the interns in going through the lectures again and again so as to understand them in our own pace.
This internship program is a successful example of online internship. The virtual classes and the online assignment on the online portal, all helped one understand the online working environment. The various professional aspects of becoming an entrepreneur in the the language society like Project Management, the various tools of Project Management, entrepreneurial skills, knowledge of quality standards, all this turned out to be a new learning experience for me as I had no prior knowledge of such terms.
In a nutshell, it was a fruitful and successful internship for me that helped me make the most of my summers. Though it was almost 3 months long, it was very comfortable to work and we were provided with sufficient amount of time to complete the assignments and there were significant gaps between two consecutive lectures which made it a slow and steady by productive learning.
Profile: www.modlingua.com/interns/444-shaifali-khulbe-french-english-translator.html
