Now in open access at “Language Testing” is an article by Ramsey Cardwell, Steven Nydick, J.R. Lockwood and Alina von Davier on building concordances between English tests. The article describes the unique method they used to create a concordance table for the DET, TOEFL and IELTS tests. Worth reading, if you are into that sort of thing.
Concordance tables can be amusing. Certain institutions are somewhat lazy about updating their score requirements. Though the folks at Duolingo updated their concordance tables back in August of 2022, many instructions haven’t bothered to adjust their requirements to match them. Pearson updated the concordance tables for the PTE back in 2020 and, again, many institutions haven’t updated their requirements. The tables had to be changed since the tests themselves had changed… but some institutions now have score requirements that are probably lower than they think they are.
Meanwhile, as I’ve noted here, the score requirements for Canada’s Student Direct Stream don’t seem to match any score concordance table I’ve ever seen. Perhaps the folks at IRCC are depending on a score conversion that hasn’t been made available to the public.
I’ve got my fingers crossed that the REOI from the Australian Department of Home Affairs will nudge ETS into producing a new concordance table for the TOEFL and IELTS test. The current one seems to be based on data gathered in 2008 and 2009 and the content and grading of the TOEFL test has changed significantly since that time.