ALTE
Association of Language Testers in Europe
As an ALTE member, Cambridge ESOL works in partnership with 31 organisations on the development of assessment standards for European languages.
EU projects
Cambridge ESOL – through its role as the member representing English and as founder member of ALTE – has been involved in a number of EU projects such as developing item writer guidelines and a multilingual testing glossary, among others. Cambridge ESOL continues to contribute its expertise to language assessment projects for the benefit of the European Union.
Council of Europe projects
As an organisation with participatory status in the Council of Europe, ALTE contributes to a number of important projects, one of which is the development of a manual to help exam providers relate their examinations to the CEFR. The Language Policy Division of the Council of Europe is developing a toolkit of materials to illustrate the CEFR levels and aid uniform interpretation and translation by all language professionals. Cambridge ESOL produced a DVD with samples of oral performance in English for the toolkit. This material demonstrates performance at the different levels and standards to be reached. It also contributed written performance examples to help the specification and standardisation process for writing and has provided items for a CD-ROM for testing reading and listening comprehension skills in English.
In a separate project, Cambridge ESOL and other ALTE representatives were invited to join a group tasked with examining ‘Language Migration and Social Cohesion’ issues to provide advice and support to those government departments and non-governmental organisations which are engaged in matters of migration and citizenship.
Quality Management System for language testing
ALTE has developed a Quality Management System (QMS) designed especially so that language tests can function in a large range of diverse contexts. It guides ALTE members on quality issues for language testing. An auditing system was designed to share best practice in language testing across Europe to help members ensure that their own language tests meet the minimum testing standards and to help them improve their testing systems where required. Pilot audits and reviews were successfully run during the period, and the first round of live audits is planned for early 2007.
Working with the United Nations
In July 2006, ALTE was granted the title of NGO in Special Consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (ECOSOC). This is an exciting development as organisations with this status can make a contribution to the work programmes and goals of the United Nations by serving as technical experts, advisers and consultants to governments and secretariat.