Language proficiency testing has long played a role as both facilitator and barrier in global migration. This paper outlines how Canada and other traditional migrant destination countries use English-language proficiency testing for immigration, asylum and resettlement, and citizenship. It identifies commonalities between these three related areas…

In this paper we use historic score-reporting records and test-taker metadata to inform data-driven recommendations that support international students in their choice of undergraduate institutions for study in the United States. We investigate the use of Structural Topic Modeling (STM) as a context-aware, probabilistic recommendation method that…

Many candidates undertaking high-stakes English language proficiency tests for academic enrolment do not achieve the results they need for reasons including linguistic unreadiness, test unpreparedness, illness, an unfavourable configuration of tasks, or administrative and marking errors. Owing to the importance of meeting goals or out of a belief…

The ACTFL Assessment of Performance Toward Proficiency in Languages (AAPPL, https://www.actfl.n.d.org/assessments/k-12-assessments/aappl) assesses proficiency in 11 languages for students in grades 3 to 12 and is often used to award the Seal of Biliteracy. While arguments for the valid interpretation and uses of the AAPPL have previously been…

This test review focuses on the current version (2009) of [Chinese characters omitted] (Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi), literally translated as the Chinese Language Proficiency Test and abbreviated as HSK. Tailored to non-native speakers of the Chinese language, this test consists of six proficiency levels (Levels 1 and 2 as beginners, Levels 3 and 4 as…

To motivate learners to engage in writing courses and help to improve their writing performance, a mobile-game-based collaborative prewriting approach was proposed in this study. A quasi-experiment was implemented by recruiting two classes of non-English major students from a university in northeastern China. Class 1 learned to write under the…

During the past two decades, an increasing number of European countries have introduced language requirements for residency, citizenship, and sometimes even for entry to the country and family reunification. As a result, democratic rights as well as basic human rights have come to depend upon an individual's ability to obtain a certain score on a…

The English Resultative Construction (ERC) is a satellite-framed structure with no identical equivalent in Spanish. In a series of studies, we analyzed and compared recognition (acceptability judgment task) and comprehension (sentence comprehension task) of three ERC subtypes with the English Depictive Construction (EDC) (which has a Spanish…

This article examines the implications of argument-based validity for the continued development of dynamic assessment (DA) research and practice. We propose that the move toward validation as a process of interpretation and evidence-based argument is commensurable with DA but that fundamental ontological differences with conventional approaches to…

Administration of high-stakes language proficiency tests has been disrupted in many parts of the world as a result of the 2019 novel coronavirus pandemic. Institutions that rely on test scores have been forced to adapt, and in many cases this means using scores from a different test, or a new online version of an existing test, that can be taken…

Despite the numerous reforms that Thailand's educational system has undergone, test scores show that a majority of the population still lacks the ability to use English with the skill required to compete in the international community. While many reasons have been proposed for Thailand's poor ranking, only a small number have looked beyond…

The Test of German as a Foreign Language (TestDaF) plays a critical role as a standardized test of German language proficiency. Developed and administered by the Society for Academic Study Preparation and Test Development (g.a.s.t.), TestDaF was launched in 2001 and has experienced persistent annual growth, with more than 44,000 test takers in…

This report summarizes the academic performance of students in the AISD secondary dual language program during 2019-2020. Topics include program and student characteristics, performance on the Texas English Language Proficiency Assessment System (TELPAS), enrollment in advanced placement (AP) courses and performance on AP exams. Due to the…

Language testing is an integral part of teaching and learning, yet most language faculty do not receive adequate training for developing tests (Taylor, [Taylor, L., 2009]). Most have advanced degrees in literary and cultural studies in the target language but often have insufficient training in pedagogy and assessment. This shortcoming is alarming…

In the late 1980s Batia Laufer worked with teachers who believed that to understand a text it was enough to understand 80% of the text's word tokens. In response, Laufer set out to calculate the minimal text coverage, i.e., percentage of running words in a text the reader should understand to comprehend it reasonably well. In 1992, she explored…