IELTS Research Reports

An impact study into the use of IELTS by professional associations and registration entities:Canada, the United Kingdom and Ireland1 INTRODUCTIONMuch has been written recently about the role English will play in post-modernist times. Englishlanguage is becoming a lingua franca for many countries, primarily due to the use of globalcommunication tools such as the internet. Academics write that the role of English language ischanging to meet the demands of ever changing global communication strategies. Some argue thatif English is spoken fluently and well and can be used in the electronic arena, then there is a reducedneed for a first language in many contexts.This would suggest that the role of language testing is likely to become increasingly important.Bodies such as medical boards, nurse registration authorities, veterinary registration authorities,pharmacy boards and other occupational regulatory bodies have recognised that English languagecommunication in an English language employment culture is critical to the public good. It thereforeserves the public interest to ensure that individuals seeking to move from non-English speakingprofessional environments to English-speaking work contexts are able to communicate effectively inEnglish. Further, there is recognition that in the global context, skills and employment mobility arenow critical and will become more so in the future as currently disadvantaged peoples seek to move tothe developed world to practise their profession.The International English Language Testing System (IELTS) was originally intended and designed asa set of international benchmarks to assess an individual’s proficiency for academic study in Englishspeakingteaching contexts. This test, in addition to other international tests designed for a similarpurpose, has now been adopted by a number of professional associations throughout the Englishspeakingworld as a reliable means of assessing the quality of communication in English language forthe professional workplace. The growing trend for IELTS to be adopted by users outside of academia,including governments, professional organisations and employers, may constitute a risk for the testowners if the assessment system cannot be validated for the purposes for which it is being used.A previous study by this author (2008) focused on the use of IELTS to assess occupationalcommunication skills in Australia, New Zealand and the USA. This study seeks to build on the formerresearch parameters and outcomes, focusing this time on Canada, the UK and Ireland.In Canada, the number of bodies registered as accepting IELTS has grown from five to ten in the lastfour years. In the UK and Ireland the number of registered users in this category has grown from ninein 2004 to thirteen in 2009, most of these in the UK.The majority of associations, as was found in Australia, New Zealand and the USA (Merrifield 2008),represent the health professions and so the accuracy of the assessment tool constitutes high stakesto both the sector and to IELTS. If the number of users continues to grow at the rate it is currentlygrowing, development of a body of knowledge of what is happening in the professional world isan important aspect of risk management for the managing partners. The IELTS partners need tounderstand the non-expert’s perception of how good the “fit” is, the means by which entry level bandscores are established, how often minimum levels are revisited and what support might be neededfrom the IELTS administration. This report addresses these issues.The second main area of risk to IELTS is the competitive environment in which it operates. Priorto the global expansion of IELTS, the best language assessment tools available and accessible weretraditionally the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) and the Cambridge ESOL (Englishfor Speakers of Other Languages) suite of tests. The TOEFL is designed and operated by EducationalIELTS Research Reports Volume 1125