Let's get together to send the TOEFL iBT complaint to ETS and NABP

[knok]

http://www.pro-match.com/toeic/TOEFLvsIELTSComparisonChart.pdf IELTS/ TOEFL iBT comparison by ETS

Here is how ETS convinces NABP. You will be surprised how ETS gives vague statement on the comparison. Actually, IELTS gives interactive test for decades.

http://jasonrenshaw.typepad.com/ibt_...ibt_and_i.html

Since the page is hard to read, I will copy it to this quote.

Quote:

"iBT Speaking and Writing
Jason Renshaw's Weblog for teachers and students interested in the Speaking and Writing sections of the iBT TOEFL« iBT TOEFL Writing Task 1 (Integrated Task): Sample question, responses, scores and feedback | Main | Information about iBT Prep Coursebooks »

April 02, 2007

TOEFL iBT and IELTS Tests Compared

I recently found a very interesting PDF page link that compares the basics of TOEFL iBT and the IELTS test.

I was surprised to see that TOEFL has a bigger reach than IELTS - I'd heard in the past that IELTS had more test takers.

I also chuckled when I saw that the comparison claims that the iBT has integrated tasks where IELTS does not. To my mind, the first of the writing tasks on IELTS clearly requires integration of reading and writing skills, and the fact that their speaking tasks involve interacting with a face-to-face interviewer (and one task where test-takers have to interact with another test-taker on-site) should lead to the general assumption that integration of skills is intrinsic to these tasks.

We shouldn't lose sight of the fact here that IELTS scores have always had a stronger correlation to actual academic ability in English-speaking tertiary contexts, and the iBT speaking section in particular was added to make the iBT more competitive with IELTS, which has had a tried and true speaking section for decades.

Don't forget also that ETS has been staring down the barrel of IELTS starting to infringe on its home territory (the United States), with dozens of US universities starting to accept IELTS scores due to its stronger reputation as a genuine measure of academic English ability in all skill areas.

I wonder if iBT will become a sort of "The Empire Strikes Back" maneuver for ETS. Mmmm...."

[knok]

Here is a presentation from ETS regarding TOEFL IBT score report. We complained to NABP on the first petition in 2005 that the score report was incredibly slow, inauthentic use of content(nothing to do with pharmacy career), and no evaluation sheet.

Is that true that there are 3-5 raters on the speaking section.( page 11 on the link below) Who knows?

I think that this presentation convinces NABP to continue to use only ETS.

http://www.oura.ca/conf2006/papers/4A-DougRonson.pdf

[knok]

-
http://tesl-ej.org/ej37/a1abs.html

(Full HTML)

http://tesl-ej.org/ej37/a1.pdf

(Full Article) Please read step 7, page 5. It says, for ITAs, the mean score of the panelists suggests a TAST score of 23 for the cut off for the minimally acceptable speaker.

[knok]

http://www.csuohio.edu/gradcollege/f...%2011-2005.pdf

According to the link above, ETS says that a score of 23 is minimum requirement for International Teaching Assistants.

[knok]

http://www.temple.edu/grad/documents...on6-1-2005.pdf

23 is enough.

[emac]

Exactly that's the point. If English is not even the official language, why to set such a high requirement? One thing is to communicate generally well-score 23- and another totally different is to communicate excellently well -score 26- as NABP requires. Again, this is a discriminatory requirement against foreign people who speak English as 2nd language. We should say it out loud, SAY NO TO DISCRIMINATORY REQUIREMENTS!!!

By the way, yesterday I sent the link about the results of scoring made public by ETS to Florida Board of Pharmacy. No response yet, but I hope they will start questioning a lot stuffs about this unfair exam.

Keep up with the good job knok. What you and the other friends in this forum are doing is really inspiring. Can't wait to read the draft next week. Thank you all.

[knok]

Let's look at the criticism Wikipedia says:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IELTS

It says that the number of IELTS users has increase from 100,000 in 1999 to half a million in 2003.

Everyone,

Please help finding evidence to submit to NABP. The more references we have, the stronger our arguments are.

Thank you.

Best Regards,

Knok

[tobeekulit]

If the University of Houston, College of Pharmacy recognizes IELTS in assessing a candidates proficiency of the English language maybe NABP can do the same.

Link : http://bandscore.ielts.org/course_info.aspx?OrgId=2159

[knok]

Thanks for the link. The University of Houston, College of Pharmacy requires IELTS 6.5 for the Ph.D. programs.

Check this link:

http://www.uh.edu/pharmacy/pdf/Admis...quirements.pdf

[emac]

knok,
check this link http://www.usmle.org/bulletin/2007/examcontent.htm

It seems that for foreign MD the English requirement is measured thru an English proficiency exam administered by the same certification authority. It is part of the 3 steps of the certification process. Basically the English Test is simulation of a patient-doctor interaction, like happens in the real life.
They do not follow ETS and any other institution advising. What they care is that a foreign MD have to be able to communicate with his/her patients generally well.
It might set an example for NABP.