Long days in traffic. Long days at the office following someone else’s schedule. Hours frantically trying to catch up for the tardiness of someone else’s work and missed deadlines.
Sound familiar?
Are you one of the many Americans who finds that the day to day struggle of being at work is both exhausting and frustrating? Too often people find themselves in a career that depends upon the success of others. After even a few months or even years of trying to make up for someone else’s lateness or mistakes, some workers make the decision to pursue a career that they can control themselves.
Being a court reporter is an opportunity to, in many cases, work your own schedule and be in charge of the number of hours that you work. In fact, NCRA court reporters are part of the more than 70% of the nation?s 50,000 court reporters who work outside of the court. After proper training and initial experience, many court reporters are able to select the number of hours that they work in a week and decide when during the day they will work those hours.
NCRA court reporters have duties that include listening in court or outside of court to proceedings. Because all testimony, as well as motions and directions from judges, need to be written, a court reporters job is consistent and important. In cases where a jury is needed, court reporter recorded transcripts provide the group with what the judge directs them to have. In the case of a trial that is decided by a judge, the transcripts are a documentation of exactly what is said in the court room.
Additionally, NCRA court reporters create written transcripts from evidence that is submitted in video or audio format. Court reporter responsibilities, in fact, are to create a written record of everything that is involved in a case. Video depositions, for example, require both a court recorder as well as court videographers.
Do You Have the Skills It Takes to Become on of the Country’s NCRA Court Reporters?
In a time when more people are looking for ways to make a living but also be more in control of their schedules, self directed careers like court reporting are becoming increasingly popular. Workers who have spent years providing secretarial services for hectic offices, for example, may have exactly the skills needed to become a court reporter. Do You have these skills:
- Attention to detail.
- Ability to focus on a task until it is completed.
- The ability to type 225 words a minute.
- The willingness to learn a new keyboard shorthand that will help you reach the 225 words per minute rate.
- The willingness to practice as many as 15 hours each week transcribing spoken word in order to develop these typing skills.
- The willingness to attend classes to learn the craft of court reporting.
In a nation that has courtrooms across America filled with trials of all kinds, it should come as no surprise that the field of court reporting is growing. In fact, the career of court reporters is projected to grow 10% between the years 2012 and 2022. Currently, NCRA represents 20,000 stenographers in the U.S. In the year 2012, there were 21,200 court reporters in the America. As the number of cases continue to grow, however, the court reporting industry knows that they will need many more people.
In addition to paying attention to detail, the court reporting education program and certification process takes an average of 33.3 months. This means that in just under three years interested candidates could learn a skill that will provide them an increasing number of jobs for years to come. At the center of one kind of court reporter training is learning how to use and master a stenographer machine. This machine is used to record shorthand of the spoken word at speeds of up to 225 words per minute. Later this shorthand is translated back into a complete document of the spoken events in a court room.
While being stuck in traffic during both the commute to and from work may be tolerated by many, if you are someone who would like to work toward a job at home court reporting may be a job for you.
