Pearson has announced a new test for university admissions called the “Pearson English Express Test.” It is targeted at students seeking admission to American universities. According to information published by Pearson this week, the test will take one hour to complete, results will be available in 48 hours, and the price will start at $70. It will be taken at home and a secondary camera will be required. It isn’t immediately clear when the test will go live, but the website claims that it is already accepted by some (unnamed) American universities.
A 30-minute practice test is available, as are descriptions and samples of each item type.
At first glance, it looks like this test is based on (extremely similar to?) the “Versant by Pearson English Certificate” product, which is no longer available for purchase.
Obviously, Pearson’s test shares some characteristics with the Duolingo English Test. Indeed, I suspect the DET will be its main competition in the short term.
Just a quick note that Galvanize has a coupon code to help students save money on sending score reports. Using the code GALVANIZEASR7 at checkout should lead to a 7% discount. I think it works in all countries. I mention it here because people frequently ask me for discount codes for sending score reports, and this is the only one I’ve ever seen. For other codes, check here.
I’m often asked how long it takes for TOEFL paper score reports to arrive. Some people ask this question after they’ve been waiting for a long time.
There is no way to answer this question. Sometimes it takes a very long time. Sometimes the paper score report never comes.
Basically, unless you pay for “express shipping” ETS just shoves your score report into an envelope that it gives to the regular US Postal Service,* who then hands the envelope off to your local postal service. That means the score report could arrive in a few weeks… or longer. Or not at all. It mostly depends on how reliable your local postal service is, because that’s who will deliver it to your address. I’ve lived in countries where the local postal service is completely unreliable and mail never reached me.
Needless to say, there is no tracking when you opt for free shipping. ETS has no idea where your score report is after they give it to the US Postal Service.**
If you really need a paper score report, you should definitely pay for express shipping at checkout. I think the fee for that is $15 if you pay before taking the test, and $40 if you pay after taking the test. That way the report is sent via a courier and tracking is usually provided.
*If you live in East Asia they might use Korea Post.
We use “the” to refer to shared concepts like “the environment” and “the countryside” and “the government.”
For instance, when we say the environment, we’re usually referring to the whole natural world around us. This makes it a shared, singular concept that everyone is familiar with. Sort of like the sky or the Earth. So we can say:
“Everyone should work hard to protect the environment from being harmed.”
The countryside works the same way. It refers to the rural parts of a region or country, in contrast to towns and cities. We tend to think of it as a single general area that everyone is familiar with. So we can say:
“I would prefer to live in the countryside.”
Likewise, even though a government is made up of many people and institutions, we treat it as a single governing body that everyone is familiar with. So we can say”
“The government ought to prioritize public transportation.”
The TOEIC “Report on Test Takers Worldwide” for 2024 is now available. The report is based on responses to a questionnaire given to a total of 3,229,884 people. I think that represents the entire test taking population. The figure is just about identical to 2023 and 2022. It was about 4.8 million in 2019.
The at-home TOEFL test now includes ID verification via a mobile app called IDVaaS (developed by Entrust). It looks like test takers receive an email following their test registration with instructions on how to do it.
As I understand it, test takers must install the app and carry out the verification procedure BEFORE their testing appointment. During this procedure they’ll take a picture of their passport, and then a picture of themselves, and finally press their phone against their passport to read the chip (if applicable). More instructions can be found here.
There have been a few early reports from test takers who say they didn’t get the email. If that has happened to you, leave a comment below.
I finally uploaded the 2025 version of my guide to TOEFL Speaking Question One. It includes new sample questions, a new sample answer, a couple of templates (one reason & two reasons), some general tips and some comments about AI. It also discusses how fast you should speak when giving an answer. Check it out below, and stay tuned for the 2025 updates to questions two through four.
For those who are interested in the business of English testing, it is worth taking a second look at Table 2 in the new IELTS/TOEFL score concordance. It lists various first languages/first language groups and what percentage of the overall test taker population they made up back in 2022. If nothing else, they confirm some long standing assumptions about each test.
Note how 35.4% of TOEFL takers in 2022 used Chinese as a first language. It has long been known that China is TOEFL’s biggest market, but this number is higher than I would have guessed… even if we keep in mind that plenty of these folks took the test outside of China.
People with a first language in the Indian group made up 13.2% of all TOEFL testers. That’s a bit lower than I assumed.
Korean speakers made up 7.8% of TOEFL testers, and Japanese speakers made up 6.4%. That’s really something. China/Korea/Japan has always been the heartland of TOEFL… but a combined 50% of testers is startling. No wonder ETS is trying real hard to diversify their test taker population.
Spanish speakers made up 8.6% of TOEFL testers. This is due, in part, to the test’s traditional popularity in Mexico and in key South American markets like Colombia, Chile and Peru.
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Meanwhile, the chart shows us that 39.6% of IELTS test takers in 2022 spoke a language in the Indian group. Obviously India is critically important for the IELTS partnership.
Chinese speakers made up 15.8% of IELTS test takers. Given that IELTS-A (probably) has roughly a 3x larger worldwide footprint than TOEFL we might take this as a suggestion that IELTS is now bigger than TOEFL in China.
The third biggest language group among IELTS test takers was the South-East Asia group, representing 8.2% of all tests. Needless to say, I’ve written a ton in recent weeks about how important Vietnam is to this test.
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Note that it looks like the concordance study did not include test takers who listed English as their first language. Such testers make up a decent amount of each test’s overall population.
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It isn’t quite the same thing but, for reference, here are the top countries for the Duolingo English Test, based on test taker ID.
The UK White Paper on “Restoring Control over the Immigration System” hit a few days ago. Most of the content is outside my wheelhouse, but it did contain some important updates re: English tests. Specifically:
We will increase language requirements for Skilled Workers and workers where a language requirement already applies from B1 to B2 (Independent User) levels, in accordance with the Common European Framework for Reference for Languages (CEFR).
It is important that we ensure better integration and consistency in our requirements of family members across the immigration system so we will introduce a new English language requirement for all adult dependants of workers and students at level A1 (Basic User) to align to spousal and partner routes and will work towards increasing this requirement over time.
We want individuals to improve their English language skills over time as they continue their stay in the UK. We will introduce requirements to demonstrate progression to level A2 (Basic User) for any visa extension, and B2 (Independent User) for settlement.
We will increase our existing requirements for settlement across the majority of immigration routes from B1 to B2 (Independent User).
The Labour government is seeking to reduce migration to the UK. Needless to say, less migration = less testing. But a few things are worth noting:
Increasing requirements for work visas (and others) from B1 to B2 will lead to more re-testers. Some people study hard to reach their test score target. Other people just retest (again and again and again) until they hit it. That will be lucrative for testing firms.
The requirement that dependents prove they are at A1 will prove lucrative for testing companies. Remember that the A1 “life skills” tests take about 25 minutes to complete and generally cost about 170 GBP. These must be a pretty sweet deal for the test companies.
The requirement that certain individuals demonstrate progression from A1 to B1 may generate even more demand for these short and expensive tests.
Higher requirements might cause more people to consider tests that are popularly perceived to be easier than IELTS.
How much does it cost to administer a 25 minute test? There may be an opportunity for one of the SELT providers to undercut their competitors and grab a big part of the market. But obviously that won’t happen.
It is also worth considering that by the time these changes are implemented, we might be in the HOELT era. The HOELT tender indicates that it will include testing at the A1 and A2 levels.
Last monthMichigan Language Assessment published a concordance report comparing MET scores to IELTS scores. We’ve been blessed with a bunch of these in recent weeks. They aren’t emerging out of the blue, but instead are likely linked to the ongoing REOI from the Australian Home Office. I’m not an academic, but I imagine that it is probably a good idea to keep that in the back of your mind as you read this stuff. There are, as always, various considerations in play.
A few things are worth noting:
The study collected data from 1066 test takers who took both the MET and the IELTS. Of them, 66 were removed from the study for various reasons.
Based on the received scores, the authors note that: “The tests exhibit moderate to strong correlations between the corresponding subtests, ranging from r = 0.642 for Writing to r = 0.751 for Reading. The correlation coefficient for the MET and IELTS total scores, r = 0.872, is in the “high” to “very high” range.”
It appears that not a single participant in the study reported an IELTS writing score of 8.5 or 9.0. This is a recurring theme in all of the concordance studies I’ve read this week.
We can infer some interesting things about MET’s business model from the study. I learned that 24% of participants were based in the Philippines, 14% in Colombia and 11% in Egypt. I’ve already written here about the popularity of the MET among health care workers from the Philippines. Everyone’s got a niche, right?
To convert IELTS to TOEFL scores, consult the new chart from 2025. Many websites still use the now obsolete 2010 chart. To learn even more about converting scores, make sure to read the actual research.
Here’s a copy of the score conversion chart published by ETS:
Institutions might like this slightly more precise chart from the research report which covers all possible TOEFL scores:
ETS also publishes a chart to convert IELTS reading scores to TOEFL reading scores:
And a chart to convert IELTS listening scores to TOEFL listening scores:
And a chart to convert IELTS speaking scores to TOEFL speaking scores:
And a chart to convert between IELTS writing scores to TOEFL writing scores:
Institutions should always keep in mind what ETS and the IELTS partnership says about setting score requirements: “score users are advised not to rely solely on published score equivalences in making their decisions. They should weigh evidence from additional sources where feasible.”
The folks at LANGUAGECERT have published a new report that compares LanguageCert and IELTS scores. Note that the report is dated October 2024, but was only made available in the past couple of weeks (before that a preliminary report was available).
The report says: “The current study found a very high overall correlation between LANGUAGECERT Academic and IELTS Academic (r = .87). This strong correlation is important as it suggests a substantial similarity in the constructs measured by the two tests. It implies consistency in how the two tests rank test takers according to their language abilities and that both assess similar aspects of academic English proficiency. Scores on one test can be reasonably indicative of performance on the other. “
It is worth mentioning here that the content of the LanguageCert test is really quite similar to the IELTS Academic test (a theme I explored last year after taking the test). About half of this report compares the content of the two tests and while differences are highlighted, they aren’t quite as striking as the differences between, say, the IELTS and TOEFL tests.
Do take a moment to check page 44 of the report for some comments about how familiarity with a test can impact this sort of report. That’s a topic I’ve been mulling over since reading the new TOEFL/IELTS concordance a few days ago so I’m really happy to see it directly addressed in this report. In my neck of the woods a participant in this sort of study might be really, really, REALLY familiar with one test… and have just a passing familiarity with the other one.
Finally, there is some interesting data on page 40 that hints at which markets this test enjoys the most success. The top three nationalities of participants were: Chinese (47%), Indian (26%), Iraqi (9%). Some may be surprised that the LanguageCert test has a large Iraqi customer base, but that does track with what I’ve been told in recent months.
Slightly interesting fact: when writing about the TOEFL/IELTS concordance I observed that none of the participants achieved an IELTS writing score of 8.5 or 9.0. Of the 1008 participants in this study, one had a writing score of 8.5 and no one had a score of 9.0.
