The Rise, Fall and Re-invention of the Communicator: re-defining roles and responsibilities in educational interpreting

The title “Communication Support Worker” (CSW) in education is used to describe a role that is unique to the UK. In the mid 1980s the role was defined, and training established, to take advantage of government funding which became available through the Manpower Services Commission (MSC), and which was intended to provide greater employment opportunities for disabled people through employment training programmes. An increasing number of young deaf British
Sign Language (BSL) users were being enrolled on these programmes, and in their case, MSC funding was used to train people who could provide them with communication support and greater access. The funding was used to establish a two-year pilot communicator training initiative, run first at Bourneville College, Birmingham, and later Coventry Technical College, in collaboration with Birmingham Institute for the Deaf. At the end of the first two years, the training continued to run as the Coventry (ECSTRA) communicator’s course, and became the blueprint for communicator training courses now running in colleges across the country. (Green and Nickerson, 1992, pp117ff).