English Language Testing Society
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English Language Testing Society
Membership year: April 1- March 31
"Being able to objectively measure and demonstrate to stakeholders the progress that international students make at our school in terms of English proficiency is vitally important to promoting our school. It is very valuable for me to be able to address a group of prospective international students and parents and show them the progress that a typical student makes. However, I know that the academic leaders of our school will have many questions and concerns about the test that works best considering our mission and curriculum."
Is there professional organization that can help us learn more about English proficiency testing and assessment?
"Now that our school has begun to welcome and admit international students, all of the academic staff at the school have had to learn more about second language acquisition and assessment. For most of us, this population of students was not a group that we had anticipated having to serve when we trained to become teachers. While we have spent the time to get ourselves updated on second language teaching pedagogy and methodology, we now find that the arena of English proficiency testing and assessment comes with its unique set of complexities. The leaders at the school have begun to ask about a way for us to effectively and objectively track the English proficiency progress that international students are making at our school. At the same time, our school has a unique set of curriculum guidelines and I am concerned that any particular test will not align with our student learning objectives. I am told there are many English tests to choose from these days."
Is there a professional organization that can help us understand more about aligning an assessment with curriculum guidelines?
"The more I learn about what is ahead for my international students, the more I realize that I must be aware of the English proficiency tests they will be asked to take in the future. While the idea of preparing my students for a particular standardized test or set of tests does not appeal to me, I do acknowledge that it would be a disservice not to at least introduce my students to some of the common tasks on these tests. In addition, some of the administrators at our school have begun to talk about a way to measure and track the English proficiency progress of international students at our school."
What professional organization can quickly help me get more up to speed on the different testing options?
"It used to be that my students were only interested in preparing for one or two tests that were commonly accepted by schools for admissions purposes. However, now my students have begun to ask me about many other tests that are accepted and these tests are much different in terms of their structure, methodology, and length. Actually, I always thought that the commonly accepted tests set the standard for English proficiency testing. It's getting harder and harder to keep up with what is going on these days with English proficiency testing."
Is there a group of professionals in the field of English language testing that can help me learn more about these new tests?
"Whenever I talk to my counterparts at other universities these days, I often hear about other English proficiency tests they are using to qualify international students for degree programs. In many cases, these conversations come up in the context of student mobility as these tests report to be more accessible, convenient, shorter, and faster in reporting scores. Naturally, we are interested to know if these tests will be a true reflection of the applicants’ ability to use English for all required classwork."
It would be helpful to be able to address our questions to a professional organization whose members have expertise in these areas.
"Our district has been using the same English language proficiency test for years. When we recently conducted a review for a possible replacement for the test, we were surprised to learn how many new tests there were on the market. Doing an analysis of the tests that would be appropriate for our students will be a bigger task than anticipated."
Is there a group of testing professionals we can contact to make this task more manageable? Someone who could recommend a good way to get started?
"In the past five-to-ten years, our company has had to look for talent abroad to fill key positions in our organization. While all of this new talent have possessed the technical know-how that we have required for these positions, interpersonal communication between our domestic and international staff has been an issue. When we determined that an English proficiency test could help us better vet our international candidate pool, we had no idea the number of tests there were to choose from on the market."
With this many tests around, there must be an objective professional organization that can help us know what to look for when choosing a test.
The English Language Testing Society is compiling a directory of member experts in the field of English language testing. If you are interested in being listed*, please fill out the form below.
*Applicable for members only. If you are not a member, consider joining us by clicking here.
