For institutions where English is the primary language of instruction, English assessments for admissions such as the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) and International English Language Testing System (IELTS) give admissions decision-makers a sense of a student's skills in academic English. Despite this explicit purpose, these exams…

The RP Group's Multiple Measures Assessment Project (MMAP) produced this technical report as part of a series on how California's community colleges can ensure more English learners (ELs) successfully complete "gateway" English coursework -- courses that satisfy the English writing requirements for completion of an associate's degree as…

Reverse engineering (RE) can play an important role in the re-designing tests in L2 English. It can also enrich the aim of teaching the same as raising children through academic achievement. In addition, it can play a key role in helping students understand how much their test is valid by using Standard reverse engineering (SRE). This paper is a…

Latinx dual language learners (DLLs) are an enormous and growing student body that faces educational adversities and inequities. One of the most salient findings to emerge from decades of educational research is that DLLs who close the gap with their monolingual peers and have the best long-term academic performance are those who develop strong…

In order to comply with the regulations put forth by the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), as amended by the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), states are required to submit evidence associated with their statewide accountability systems to the United States Department of Education (ED) for peer review. Some states have elected to…

This study examines the predictive validity of the TOEFL iBT with respect to academic achievement as measured by the first-year grade point average (GPA) of Chinese students at Purdue University, a large, public, Research I institution in Indiana, USA. Correlations between GPA, TOEFL iBT total and subsection scores were examined on 1990 mainland…

Across the world, university teachers are increasingly being required to engage with diversity in the classes they teach. Using the data from a large Economics 1 class at a South African university, this attempts to understand the effects of diversity on chances of success and how assessment can impact on this. By demonstrating how theory can be…

A test measuring the teachers' Spanish proficiency was developed as part of a battery of tests for teachers in bilingual education programs--the CERAS Teacher Tests for Spanish/English Bilingual Education. Two independent studies indicated that the relationship between pupils' achievement in Spanish and English and their teachers' Spanish…

Portion of a paper given at the seminar sponsored by the South East Asian Ministers of Education Organization in Bangkok, Thailand, in May 1970. (DS)

The purpose of this document is to explore the world of assessment within the context of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. The definitions provided will help those with little knowledge of as-sessment to understand the essentials of practice and theory. The information is meant for assess-ment users so they can interpret the purpose of tests…

Argues that language tests employing methods not fair to all test takers are unethical. Ways of reducing sources of unfairness in language testing is discussed. (15 references) (Author/CK)

Practical and technical aspects of language testing research are considered in 23 articles. Topical areas include: testing of general proficiency; the hypothesis of a single unitary factor accounting for reliable variance in tests; the structure of language proficiency; pros and cons of cloze testing; a new functional testing approach; and…

Presents research rating the speaking proficiency on the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Language Oral Proficiency Interview of 40 college French students at four different levels of study. The data show a significant, positive relationship between level of proficiency and level of study. (Author/CB)

This document examines the concepts of validity, reliability, and appropriateness from a language testing perspective as they apply to the following four assessment issues raised by the National Reporting System (NRS): (1) What type of language assessment seems to be required by the NRS: proficiency or achievement?; (2) Knowing that the NRS…

This paper reports on a two-part evaluation of the Test of English at Matriculation (TEAM) in use at the University of Edinburgh. TEAM has been used since 1987 to identify entering non-native speakers of English who are likely to be at risk linguistically and who should receive English language support. Separate samples of candidates' scores were…