Michael Goodine's Blog, page 27

Pearson Campaign: Fairness in English Testing

Pearson is coming in red hot this morning with a new advertising campaign that extols the virtues of the PTE’s AI scoring and raises some pointed criticisms of the human scoring used in other tests. The above link is to one of the campaign’s Instagram videos (which is way more effective than anything found in […]

On the Usefulness of Practice Tests

Here’s a blog post from Duolingo about how DET test takers benefit from the free practice test accessed via the DET website.  Remember that this test is generated by AI, so it is different every time a test taker accesses it.  As a result, they enjoy an unlimited number of free practice tests. The blog […]

The PTE Academic Online Eliminated

I think the PTE Academic Online was eliminated in December and I didn’t notice. Did anyone else notice? Was there an announcement? I cannot register for the test via my Pearson account, and all references to it have been removed from the PTE website. When I posted about this on LinkedIn, a connection wrote the […]

Printed LanguageCert Certificate

A couple of weeks ago I received this keen certificate from LanguageCert in the mail.  It was printed on nice cardstock and came protected by a durable mailer.  Everyone who takes the LANGUAGECERT Academic test gets a certificate – it isn’t necessary to opt-in and no extra fees are charged. I appreciate how, at $165, […]

New Rules for Paper IELTS in Hong Kong

The South China Morning Post reports that residents of mainland China will no longer be permitted to take the paper-based IELTS in Hong Kong unless they can prove that they are legal residents of the city.  This mirrors recent IELTS policy changes in countries around the world which have also barred non-residents from accessing the […]

Cost to Send TOEFL Scores Now $29

Some of the supplementary TOEFL fees have been hiked. It now costs $29 to send a score report to each recipient beyond the four that are selected before test day. That’s a $4 increase per recipient. Express registration (seven days or less before the test) now costs $49. That’s a $9 increase. I don’t know […]

Where do TOEFL Test Takers Go?

Near the end of 2024 I linked to an article in the Free Press Journal which indicated that 90% of TOEFL takers send their scores to American universities.  Many readers assumed that the quoted number represented Indian test takers only, so I assembled the League of TOEFL Experts to see what people in a few […]

College Board 990 form (Year Ending December 2023)

Some test-obsessed readers may be interested to know that College Board’s most recent 990 form is now available via Propublica. It covers the year ending December 2023. According to the form, program revenues were up about 47 million dollars on the year to reach a total of 955 million dollars. Net assets hit a record […]

DET (Duolingo English Test) Price Increase

The cost of taking the Duolingo English Test was increased by $5 back on February 5. It now costs $70. The cost of registering for two tests was hiked by $8 to $118. (I will take the DET this coming week, so let me know if there is anything I should keep an eye out […]

Really old Grammar in Use

Hark!  A grammar book sighting! This well-loved copy of English Grammar in Use was spotted in Lombok.