BY September this year, several new posts will be created for court reporters in Resident Magistrate Courts islandwide to allow for a smoother flowing of proceedings and a decline in the backlog of cases.

With the expected increase in court reporters, the Justice Training Institute (JTI) is currently seeking to become registered as a tertiary level institution by the University Council of Jamaica (UCJ), to be followed by an international accreditation of its court-reporting programme by the National Court Reporters Association (NCRA) in the United States.

Director of training and academic affairs at the JTI, Edward Shakes, told JIS News that a team from the UCJ visited last month and examined the premises.

Shakes was confident that the JTI will be granted tertiary level status, and that the institution would be making an application for three of their main programmes to be accredited.

The three programmes, he said, will be the certificate programme for court reporters, which has a two-year duration; a year-long certificate in legal administration; and a certificate in criminal justice studies.

Shakes said the certificate in court reporting now being offered is tied with the same standards of what is offered in the United States as an associate degree. "In fact, the two-year programme does meet the requirement of an associate degree or a diploma, and we expect that it is coming out at over 60 credits, so we will be considering that in the future.
Persons coming through the programme will be able to go into a degree programme in court reporting that is currently offered in United States," he said.

At the same time, Shakes said the institute was having discussions with the National Court Reporting Association in the United States, which is the international benchmark for court reporting as far as standards are concerned, with a view for partnership.

"In March, we are expecting an expert in that area to visit with us for about a week and that person is a director of the National Court Reporting Association. She will be looking at our programme and will also be providing some training for our lecturers and also for court reporters in the Supreme Court while she is here," he said.

In addition to the national accreditation that the institute is seeking with the UCJ, Shakes said it would also be seeking international accreditation through the NCRA.

Currently, the institute has enrolled close to 80 persons, 22 of whom are pursuing the court reporting programme, and will graduate in August.

Although the majority of the students are now employed in the justice system in various positions, such as administrators and clerks in the courts, and also within branches of the Correctional Service and the police force, he stresses that the programmes were open to others.

"We feel that some of the programmes, in particular the court reporting programme, can attract school leavers who want to pursue a career in that area and as such, all programmes are open to persons, whether or not you are employed in the Justice system," Shakes said.

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