The Student
What qualities should a student of court reporting possess?
Well, before I give you my answer to this question, let me entice you some and suggest you look at the following website that will give you a very good indication of the future of court reporting. The National Court Reporters Association (NCRA) has put together this website with the hopes of attracting more people to the profession, be it as a court reporter, a closed-captioner, or a professional in related fields of employment.
The ideal court reporting student should meet the following criteria:
- You must have the WILL to become a court reporter and undertake the rigorous training involved to become excellent in what you do.
- You should have a very good command of the English language; in other words, strong grammar and punctuation skills.
- You should be at least a high school graduate (or equivalent).
- Good listening and hearing skills.
- A typing (keyboarding) speed of 40-60 words per minute and a fairly good knowledge of using computers and various programs, at least a word processing program and email.
Let’s face it. You could actually go to medical school or law school and become a doctor or lawyer and pass the appropriate qualifying examinations AGAINST your will, as is the case with many students following the educational expectations of their parents.
However, there is absolutely no way you could ever become a court reporter without the WILL to succeed in the profession.
If you don’t believe you have the WILL to prepare for the profession, then you should look around for something else that would meet your interests.
With regular transcription of your stenotype notes throughout your training, however, and the incidental vocabulary development along the way, your command of the English language will definitely improve.
If you have more education, that’s a plus. However, in order to sit for the various examinations offered by NCRA and the various states (or provinces in Canada), high school graduation is usually a minimum requirement.
Since you will be reporting the spoken word, obviously you should be able to hear and understand what is spoken.
Eventually, you will want to be able to use your computer or laptop with an appropriate transcription program to develop your real-time writing and transcription of your stenotype notes.