Beyond the Spectrum: Exploration

Amanda Kennon, MA, NIC is a freelance interpreter, mentor, and presenter who resides in Southeast PA. She received her B.A. in Interpreting and ASL/ Deaf Studies from Maryville College and her M.A. in. Interdisciplinary Studies: Individualized Studies: Ethics and Interpreting from George Mason University, completing her Capstone Project, “Ethics & Professional Identity: A Proposed Curriculum for Students in Interpreter Education Programs.” During her sixteen-year career, Amanda has worked as staff and freelance in various settings, frequently mentoring students and novice interpreters. Before moving to Pennsylvania, Amanda lived in Northern Virginia and was active with VRID, serving on the Board as District I Representative, Treasurer, and Vice President. During her tenure, she led discussion groups and workshops on ethical decision making; developed the Community Dialogues series, facilitating several sessions; spearheaded the establishment of the VRID Mentorship Task Force; and presented at the 2016 & 2018 VRID Conferences- culminating in the 2018 VRID President’s Award. Additionally, Amanda presented at the 2016 PCRID Conference; provided in-house professional development as a staff interpreter; and published in the RID Views.

Laura Maddux Polhemus (she/her), PhD, NIC Advanced, BEI Advanced, has been involved with the Deaf community for more than 23 years as an ASL student, interpreter, interpreter educator, and friend. Laura gained her BBA in Business Administration from Sam Houston State University before adding an AAS in Interpreter Training from Tyler Junior College. She studied Applied Linguistics at Texas Tech for her MA, and her thesis focused on having ASL students and Deaf students of English help each other with their language learning from a distance. Laura received her PhD in interpretation from Gallaudet University in 2015, during Her dissertation resulted in a publication, “Source Attribution in ASL-English Interpreter Education: Testing a Method”, with the International Journal of Interpreter Education. While obtaining her PhD she was diagnosed with ADHD, and has been on a journey to discover what that means in her life and work ever since. She has also investigated self-talk in interpreters, and published “The Committee in My Head: Examining Self-Talk of American Sign Language-English Interpreters” in Translation and Interpretation Studies. She has also done research on how novices and experts experience self-talk and how to improve interpreting students’ self-efficacy. Laura was heavily involved in planning and running the 2015 and 2019 World Association of Sign Language Interpreters Conferences. She has presented for CIT, RID, Critical Link, TSID, and more. She is currently an Assistant Professor at Bethel University in Mishawaka, IN where she searches out methods to teach her increasing number of neurodivergent students.