Reviews

“Marina has worked for the City of Boulder with Housing and Human Services over the last three years as a Spanish Language interpreter. She has played an important role in interpreting for various communities throughout our City, with often difficult conversations around the needs and challenges of the Latinx community. She is very talented in not only effectively interpreting, but in providing a bridge between different cultural dynamics in our community. I would recommend Marina LaGrave without reservation, as a professional member of any team in the important work in our community.”

— Kurt Firnhaber
Director of Housing and Human Services, City of Boulder

“"Marina LaGrave was the most inspirational and influential speaker in the Socially Responsible Leadership class I taught at CU for several years. She brought passion, authenticity, and curiosity to help students tackle challenging questions about culture, race, and inclusion. Students took Marina's message to heart in their own leadership journey..”

— Kimberly Kosmenko, M.S., Capstone Lead & Teaching Asst. Professor. Masters of the Environment (MENV) program

“Marina is absolutely amazing! She is deeply committed to language access work and is an exceptional and thoughtful partner in this space. Having worked with Marina on a wide range of interpretation and translation services - from interpreting city council meetings or small group discussions to translating working group materials - I have consistently witnessed community members be impressed with the level of Marina's skill. Her ability to balance professionalism and a warmth that instantly makes others feel more welcome is hugely appreciated. Marina excels in understanding the big picture view of presentations or discussions while maintaining key focus on the exact right words for a specific context or situation. I'm grateful for Marina's talents and have full confidence in Marina's ability to exceed the language access expectations of community members, staff, elected officials, and community organizations”

— Ryan Hanschen
Engagement Specialist, City of Boulder

“Marina LaGrave is an incredible community builder. Her patience, understanding and willingness to tackle difficult conversations head-on make her an amazing asset to any organization. Additionally, Marina's translation skills are second to none, her work is impeccable and has allowed Special Olympics Colorado to expand its mission into new communities." 

— Ben Theune
Director of Marketing, Special Olympics Colorado

“Marina has been Interpreting in Spanish for Naropa University's commencements for the past 8 years and I cannot express how much we appreciate her work. She is thoughtful, kind and very caring. She takes the time to meet each family/person who requires her services before the ceremony and ensures they are in an area to receive good reception. Her attention to detail is impeccable. She has made commencement for those families a special time. Thank you Marina!!”

— Tashi Browder
Administrator of student Affairs & international students & scholar services, Naropa University

“Marina has been a wonderful colleague over the years on numerous projects — from conducting NIH funded social science research on STEM learning and role modeling for SciGirls and Latina SciGirls, video and audio work, language access and translation/interpretation work, and project advising with educational research projects in general. I love working with Marina. Her positive attitude and creative approach challenge the status quo and make us better!

- Brad McLain, Ph.D.
NCWIT Senior Research Scientist & Director of Corporate Research

“We have been fortunate to have Marina LaGrave work on two projects for us so far. Both projects included space science content with one focused on telescope usage and the other on helping the public understand more about Earth and space. Marina is always clear on what she needs in order to do the translation work efficiently and effectively. She stays in good communication about the project and brings great energy to the work. The translations for both scientific and general language have been spot-on and were always delivered on time or earlier. We enjoy working with Marina and will look to her for all of our Spanish translation work in the future.”

— Sarah Post
Program and Library Support
Manager, Cornerstones of Science

“In multiple projects in working with Marina LaGrave, I have found her to be a strong advocate for the Latinx community and an inspirational leader.  She contributes great insight and expertise when she is on a project team, but has also designed and directed projects funded by federal and private organizations.  LaGrave is a tireless worker and she always delivers top-notch work which often goes beyond what was asked.  Her broad expertise includes serving as a leader of professional development on multicultural issues, program designer, facilitator of planning meetings and evaluation sessions, and as a highly-skilled translator and communicator of science  for many agencies, including the United Nations, the National Center for Atmospheric Research, and a variety of educational organizations. LaGrave also has rich experience in consulting on science and environmental education projects throughout Latin America.”

— Robert Russell PhD. Program Director
Education and Human Resources, National Science Foundation, Program Director (NSF) & Senior Ed. Associate

“I have worked with Marina La Grave as a CU Noyce Scholar, helping with the design and writing of lesson plans for their K-5 environmental science inquiry program, Sun Earth Connections. I am so overwhelmingly impressed with both CLACE as a dynamic, growing organization and with Marina as its passionate leader. Marina displays great vision for charting highly creative paths forward to address very challenging problems. She possesses a tremendous capacity for connecting people and ideas, across languages, cultures, and disciplines.”

— Kristine Johnson
Educator at bilingual elementary school, BVSD