DANBURY, CT, USA – 12 March 2018 This year Translators without Borders is excited to announce winners of the 6th Annual Access to Knowledge Awards. These creative, dedicated and passionate supporters are at the forefront of opening access to language equity.

The Access to Knowledge Awards are presented annually to top contributors supporting the Translators without Borders mission. These award winners are at the forefront of providing vulnerable people with access to vital knowledge in their local language. This award is the preeminent honor given to humanitarian relief and crisis response professionals working in the field of language.

More than 20 professionals were nominated in six categories, representing communities of the Caribbean, Rohingya, Malagasy, Francophone, and North America, as well as international organizations including World Health Organization, American Red Cross, and Oxfam.

“This year, the Access to Knowledge Awards reflect our core values of innovation, courage, and commitment,” says Executive Director Aimee Ansari; “our commitment to finding human-centered solutions to global challenges of language vulnerability.”

In addition to six winners, a number of honorable mentions were also chosen.

2018 Translators without Borders Access to Knowledge Awards winners are:

The Right to Knowledge Award

Rohingya Refugee Response Team.

This group of dedicated volunteers has translated urgent and essential health care materials that help refugees living in precarious conditions protect themselves.

The Excellence Award

Alan Barrett

Alan has gone above and beyond the call-of-duty in helping Translators without Borders meet its mission by dedicating expertise and time to the transition towards a technically enhanced platform that will better serve partners and the community.

The Empowerment Award

French Volunteer Translators

This team’s mentoring of new French translators has allowed Translators without Borders to significantly increase language capacity and guarantee quality of translation for one of our most requested language pairs (English to French).

The Communicator of the Year Award

Andrew Hickson

Andrew has committed dedicated and energetic efforts, on social media and while attending industry events, to build awareness of Translators without Borders and the need to provide content in the right language.

The Humanitarian Communicator Award

Refucomm

This non-profit has tested innovative approaches to information dissemination in the context of the European refugee response; as a result, more refugees and migrants, many speaking minority languages, have better access to critical knowledge.

The Donor Award

Translated, MateCat

In 2017, this Translators Without Borders bronze sponsor provided the translation team with its online CAT tool, MateCat. This allowed us to greatly improve and enhance the translation work of our community and partners.

Honorable Mentions

John Paul Dantanus, The Malagasy Translation Team, Ejila Makangu (Ebola Response Translator), The eCancer Hindi team, World Health Organization, International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Multilingual Magazine, and Omar Abou-Samra (American Red Cross).

For a complete list of honorable mentions and details about the work of these award winners, visit https://translatorswithoutborders.org/winners-6th-annual-access-to-knowledge-awards/.

Entries for the 2019 Translators without Borders Access to Knowledge Awards will open in December.

About Translators without Borders

Translators without Borders envisions a world where knowledge knows no language barriers. The US-based non-profit provides people access to vital knowledge in their language by connecting nonprofit organizations with a professional community of volunteer translators, building local language translation capacity, and raising awareness of language barriers. Originally founded in 1994 in France as Traducteurs sans Frontières (now its sister organization), Translators without Borders translates more than eight million words per year. In 2012, the organization established a Healthcare Translators’ Training Center in Nairobi, Kenya.

Please direct all media enquiries to Rebecca Petras, rebecca@translatorswithoutborders.org