Oral FCICE
This summer, August 2022, I sat the oral portion of the Federal Court Interpreter Certification Exam (FCICE), and found out in November that I passed on the first attempt. I took the written portion of the FCICE in June of 2019, which you can read about here . This blog post will address the factors that I believe contributed to success on the exam. I will not spend time detailing the layout or contents of the exam, as the AOUSC publishes an in-depth handbook with everything an examinee needs to know. Here is the TL;DR (“too long; didn’t read”) version: during the 3 years between passing the written exam and sitting the oral exam, 1) I interpreted for 2 years as a freelancer in state and federal court; 2) I completed 2 semesters of a Master of Arts in Conference Interpretation ; and 3) I committed 100–120 hours to FCICE-specific preparation in the 4 weeks leading up to the exam. Let’s look closer at each of these factors and how they got me where I needed to be. I’ll then share my p