Michael Goodine's Blog, page 38

Buyouts at ETS, Layoffs Likely to Come

Inside Higher Ed  is reporting this evening that testing firm Educational Testing Service (ETS) has offered voluntary buyouts to every employee in the United States with more than two years of service at the firm. The publication refers to this as “massive downsizing.” This news comes just a few weeks after layoffs that affected about […]

Disruption in English Language Testing

Given the recent goings-on at IDP Education (layoffs and downsizing), I think it’s worth repeating my standard pitch for disruption in the English testing industry.  I posted this on LinkedIn a few days ago, but I realize that some very smart people don’t use that platform. I’ll preface this by pointing out that while on […]

Notes from DETcon24

Last week I attended DETcon24 (that is, the 2024 edition of the Duolingo English Test Convention) in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.  That’s the annual event that Duolingo holds to help stakeholders (from universities, mostly) become familiar with the DET.  Since I’m not affiliated with a university, I was really flattered when the Duolingo folks extended an invitation. […]

TOEFL Price Drop in Japan

According to an email I just received, the cost of taking the TOEFL iBT Test will be reduced in Japan due to the “historic depreciation” (I translated this phrase from the Japanese) of the Yen. From June 5 to September 30, the cost will be $199. That’s down from $245. If anyone spots changes in […]

IDP Education Layoffs

IDP Education will lay off about 6% of its global workforce.  I’ve been told that some affected individuals have already received the news. According to a “Regulatory and Market Update” released to investors, IDP predicts that the international education market will decline by 25% next year.  We’ll see. Caps will impact Canada and Australia volumes […]

A Few More ETS Layoffs

ETS filed a new WARN Notice, noting seven more layoffs in New Jersey, effective September and August of this year.  Sixty-two layoffs effective July of this year were previously announced. Late last year 126 layoffs were announced, effective (I think) January 2024.  That’s quite a lot of layoffs so far this year.

TOEFL’s Vibrant Periwinkle Rebrand

I got this press release the other day about TOEFL’s “vibrant rebrand.” It notes, in part: “The new logo includes a stylized asterisk symbol, which it shares with the recently rebranded ETS, signifying both brands’ commitment to advancing the science of measurement through groundbreaking research to power human progress. The updated signature TOEFL periwinkle color […]

TOEIC 2023 Worldwide Stats

The 2023 “Report on Test Takers Worldwide” for TOEIC is now available. Interesting reading, if you are into that sort of thing.  It includes score data from around the world, but note that most of the test-takers are in Japan and Korea.  Probably more than 80%. A total of 3.2 million test takers answered the […]

As a wise man – me – once said…

I always get a kick out of these social media posts where ETS head Amit Sevak quotes himself.

Some TOEFL TestReady Updates

I spotted a couple of updates to the TOEFL TestReady platform today. They are: More free stuff is available. Students can now access the “section test sampler” which provides free access to one task from each section of the TOEFL (unscored, I think) and the “section practice sample” which provides the same (scored, I think). […]