Applying the partial credit method of Rasch analysis: language testing and accountability

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/68583/2/10.1177_026553228900600109.pd

Review

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/90372/1/3587511.pd

Reflecting on the past, embracing the future

In the Call for Papers for this anniversary volume of Assessing Writing, the Editors described the goal as “to trace the evolution of ideas, questions, and concerns that are key to our field, to explain their relevance in the present, and to look forward by exploring how these might be addressed in the future” and they asked me to contribute my thoughts. As the Editor of Assessing Writing between 2002 and 2017—a fifteen-year period—I realised from the outset that this was a very ambitious goal, l, one that no single paper could accomplish. Nevertheless, it seemed to me an opportunity to reflect on my own experiences as Editor, and through some of those experiences, offer a small insight into what this journal has done (and not done) to contribute to the debate about the “ideas, questions and concerns”; but also, to suggest some areas that would benefit from more questioning and thinking in the future. Despite the challenges of the task, I am very grateful to current Editors Martin East and David Slomp for the opportunity to reflect on these 25 years and to view them, in part, through the lens provided by the five articles appearing in this anniversary volume

Opposing tensions of local and international standards for EAP writing: programmes: who are we assessing for?

In response to recent curriculum changes in secondary schools in Hong Kong including the implementation of the 3e3e4 education structure, with one year less at high school and one year more at university and the introduction of a new school leavers' exam, the Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education (HKDSE), universities in the territory have revisited their English language curriculums. At City University a new EAP curriculum and assessment framework was developed to fit the re-defined needs of the new cohort of students. In this paper we describe the development and benchmarking process of a scoring instrument for EAP writing assessment at City University. We discuss the opposing tensions of local (HKDSE) and international (CEFR and IELTS) standards, the problems of aligning EAP needs-based domain scales and standards with the CEFR and the issues associated with attempting to fulfil the institutional expectation that the EAP programme would raise students' scores by a whole CEFR scale step. Finally, we consider the political tensions created by the use of external, even international, reference points for specific levels of writing performance from all our students and suggest the benefits of a specific, locallydesigned, fit-for-purpose tool over one aligned with universal standards

Recent Publications on Statistics, Language Testing and Quantitative Research Methods: II

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/90110/1/3586903.pd

Purposes of assessment

Commissioned as the lead paper in the Volume, this chapter shows how the terms assessment, testing, examining and evaluation have become increasingly intertwined, and multiple new terms have emerged. The chapter takes a somewhat historical view as it lays out a picture of the ways that the field of language ‘assessment’ has expanded its knowledge and skills but also its socio-political effects. Taking the notion of ‘purposes’ as a broad organizing principle, the chapter is intended to introduce new readers in this field to the wide range of issues current in the field, and prepare them for the more specific chapters that follow