Transcription and Proofreading Accuracy
What this domain tests
This domain covers turning shorthand notes into a certified, readable transcript: page and line format, accurate speaker designations, proper question-and-answer structure, and parentheticals for events that are not spoken.
Transcript conventions
- Number every line and page, and keep speaker designations consistent (THE COURT:, MR. REYES:, Q., A.).
- Use parentheticals for non-verbal events - (Off the record.), (Whereupon, the witness stepped down.) - instead of inventing dialogue.
- Designate exhibits at the moment they are marked, with the number or letter and the sponsoring speaker.
Proofreading in passes
- Pass one: sense and syntax. Read aloud to catch dropped negatives and reversed names.
- Pass two: proper nouns, numbers, dates, and amounts, checked against exhibits and earlier spellings on the record.
- Pass three: cross-references, defined terms, quoted exhibits, and line references.
Worked example
The judge says “Counsel, sidebar,” and nothing else is audible for two minutes. The correct treatment is a parenthetical such as (At sidebar, out of the hearing of the jury; proceedings not reported.). You do not reconstruct the sidebar from memory, and you do not label the whole passage “inaudible” if you were simply directed off the record. The reasoning: the transcript records what occurred on the record, and an off-record sidebar is an event, not testimony.
Traps that cost marks
- Homophones: counsel/council, statute/statue, lien/lean, waiver/waver.
- Silently improving a witness’s grammar, which changes the record.
- Mixing draft and certified versions, or omitting the certification page and the errata procedure.