How to Budget for Multilingual Communication

A workshop for organizations interested in multilingual community outreach and engagement.

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**DATE UPDATED** This workshop will now take place on Tuesday, January 23, 2024 at 4 pm ET.

Cost: Pay What You Can (all proceeds benefit the #TranslateTheMovement campaign

About the workshop: The workshop is a 2-hour overview of how to guide your organization or community group in budgeting for multilingual communication. By the end of the workshop, participants will feel better equipped to answer 10 important questions related to the budgeting process. These questions include:

  • Who needs to be involved in budgeting conversations? 
  • What if our organizational budget is already set and doesn't include funds for multilingual communication?
  • What questions should we answer before beginning the budgeting process?
  • When do we need to budget for professional language support?
  • Where should multilingual communication be placed in the budget?
  • Why is it critical to budget for multilingual communication?
  • How do we estimate what interpreting and translation support will cost?
  • How do we evaluate quotes and proposals from interpreters, translators, language justice practitioners and other linguists?
  • How do we save money without compromising our organizational values for language justice?
  • How does the language(s) spoken by our internal team/staff impact the budget?

This is not a "what is language justice" or "how to plan logistics for a multilingual event" workshop. This a hands-on, interactive "how much should/will this cost us" workshop that assumes participants are already clear that their budgeting, planning and logistics for multilingual communication MUST center principles of language justice. Participants unfamiliar with language justice are encouraged to read up on the topic before coming. An excellent resource hub to learn more about language justice can be found in the Move To End Violence resource library. The workshop will be facilitated in English/Black English (and maybe a likkle Spanglish/Spanish or French). Interpretation will be provided upon request for ASL, English, French, Portuguese, and Spanish.

Who is this for: The workshop is designed for staff/members of organizations and community groups who want to support their organization in relationship building and outreach with/to people who speak various languages. It is also specifically designed for those who are ready to plan for multilingual communication that centers principles of language justice. This workshop is well suited for organizations with operating budgets of any amount. However, organizations that have the capacity to allocate/re-allocate at least $25,000 towards an annual budget for multilingual communication will have greater capacity to implement what they learn.

Accessibility Info/Requests: The workshop will be facilitated in English. Interpretation will be provided upon request for participants with the following dominant languages (i.e., languages they use more):  ASL, French, Portuguese, Spanish. Email [email protected] with accessibility requests. Requests must be received by Tuesday, January 16, 2024 at 11:59 pm.

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