Źródła niepowodzeń na egzaminie na tłumacza przysięgłego z perspektywy egzaminatora

The pass rate in the examination to become a sworn translator, being much lower than 50 per cent, gives rise to questions about the reasons for failing the examination by more than half of candidates. In the paper, the author tries to answer these questions, taking into account such factors as how well candidates are prepared for the examination, the system of translator and interpreter training, the written and oral examination procedure, the range of examination topics and necessary specialist terminology, the selection of examination texts, the translation brief, time pressure and assessment subjectivity. In conclusion, the author states that examination failures may be attributed to five factors: examinees’ unsatisfactory knowledge and skills (the lack of adequate native and foreign language skills, the lack of a thorough knowledge of Polish law and the law of the foreign language country or countries, a limited specialist vocabulary, insufficient mastery of translation techniques and strategies and a poor knowledge of the rules for doing certified translations), the system of teaching Bachelor’s and Master’s degree students (ineffective with regard to the requirements of the examination in question), the examination structure, requirements and the method of its administration (a quite high pass threshold, examination conditions – both in the oral part and in the written part – differing from typical sworn translator’s working conditions, broad examination scope and the necessity to develop an extensive specialist vocabulary), examiners’ subjectivity (the arbitrariness of examiners’ decisions in the case of relative/non-binary errors) and – to a certain extent – the provision of insufficient information by the examination institution.