Needing help translating a sentence please.
I would like to tell my new German friend of my past job. How would I properly say:
"I was the Superintendent's secretary at Aurora Public Schools in Aurora, Illinois."
Thank you in advance for suggestions.
5 Comments
530
That’s a mouthful to translate! :)
One thing to keep in mind is that job titles very often do not translate well into other languages. Maybe go for a description of your duties, what you actually do every day. That would be much more meaningful to a German. What exactly does a superintendent do? What does their secretary do?
Thanks Jileha. Would this work however, "Ich war die Sekretärin in dem Landratsamt." ?
- 530
“im Landratsamt” would be more commonly used. But I have no idea what the Landratsamt is. Also, secretaries can have different job functions, cf. in the extreme the Secretary of State. In German, Sekretärin is usually somebody who takes dictation, types out letters and communications, makes appointments for the boss, etc. If these were your main tasks, then Sekretärin would be OK.
"Landratsamt" is the district administration in general, there is no connection with schooling.
I suppose the superintendent for schools would be "Schulrat / Schulrätin". The "Sekretärin des Schulrats / der Schulrätin" would help him/her in his/her daily tasks.
If your job was more about school administration than personal assistance, you could say "Ich habe in der Schulaufsichtsbehörde" gearbeitet.
- 1124
"ich war die Sekretärin des Schulrates im Schulbezirk Aurora/Ill." or, to confuse you a bit more, "...des für die öffentlichen Schulen zuständigen Schulrates in Aurora/Ill."
