Free English tests for students / Ministry to pay for proficiency checks at public schools from 2012

The Yomiuri Shimbun

In a bid to boost English skills among youngsters, the education ministry will allow students at a certain number of public middle and high schools to take English proficiency tests at government expense starting from the 2012 school year, it has been learned.

Under the envisaged project, the Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Ministry will pick eight middle and high schools in each prefecture where students can take the Eiken and other English proficiency tests free of charge, according to ministry sources.

The ministry will designate four of the eight as pilot schools where extensive English instruction will be provided, mainly by native speakers. It will then compare test scores of students between the two groups so it can improve the pedagogy at public schools to boost English skills among students overall, the sources said.

This will be the first project in which the ministry will allow students at public middle and high schools to take English proficiency tests administered by the private sector at government expense, according to the sources.

The Eiken is administered by the Society of Testing English Proficiency. The fee for taking the Grade 3 test, the fifth-highest level out of seven, suitable for middle school graduates, is about 2,500 yen.

Under the envisaged project, however, students will not be given qualifications for taking the Eiken and other tests, as they will be conducted as part of the ministry's assessment of their skills, the sources said.

The ministry will encourage public middle and high schools to apply for the eight-school quota per prefecture. However, if some prefectures fail to fill their quotas, the vacancy will be allocated to others, the sources said.

The ministry will designate two middle and two high schools as pilot institutions in each prefecture by the end of this school year in March. These schools will be urged to increase the opportunities for students to be exposed to English in addition to regular classes through, for example, English clubs and field trips to companies to observe transactions in English.

The ministry will examine how effective these pilot schools' approaches to teaching are by comparing test scores of their students and those of children at the nonpilot schools.

For the fiscal 2012 budget, the ministry has requested about 200 million yen for conducting English proficiency tests for about 65,000 middle and high school students and designating pilot schools. It also plans to expand the number of public schools participating in the project beyond the 2012 school year, with the hope of continuing it for at least five years.

According to 2010 data by the Test of English as a Foreign Language--used as an admission requirement by higher educational institutions in English-speaking countries--Japan ranked 27th out of 30 Asian countries, with an average score of 70 out of 120.