Found in Translation’s (FIT) founder, Maria Vertkin, learned first-hand the hardships of being a low-income, multilingual, immigrant woman in America. As a social worker, she met homeless and struggling women who had valuable linguistic talents but faced systemic barriers to meaningful employment such as discrimination, limited ability to pay for education, lack of childcare, and transportation.
Meanwhile, she saw that hospitals in Boston struggle to find bilingual talent to meet the growing need for interpreters, leading to costly and even fatal medical errors. Maria saw an opportunity at the intersection of these two persistent social problems. In response, she launched Found in Translation which trains low-income women to become medical interpreters, who then support equitable care to all demographics of patients through their work. The program is free of charge for participants and in addition to the training for medical interpreter certificate they provide on-site childcare, transportation assistance, mentoring, and career coaching; and leads directly into employment opportunities.
Partnering with The Lynch Foundation
Found in Translation approached The Lynch Foundation in 2021 to scale their program to serve more women. At this time the organization was in their tenth year and was ready to grow their impact while simultaneously the demand had increased significantly due to the pandemic. The Lynch Foundation recognized that Found in Translation is transformative to both the women they serve and the broader Boston community and the importance in increasing their services. Thus, the Foundation provided a three-year grant to expand their capacity to serve more women, support their alumnae, and expand their partnerships.