Not new news on Nova,…
…but nicely summarized.
I take it all back about Time magazine. It may not be the Economist or L’Express, or even El Pais Sunday magazine, but they have managed the article about Nova from a publication outside Japan with least factual errors. My one quibble is using TOEIC scores as a comparison of language learning levels in different countries.
As TOEIC is a test that not everyone takes in any of those countries, using all the scores from each country is a bit like comparing the education systems of other countries to the UK by only looking at their GCSE scores- in other countries only an elite of people in International schools would be taking GCSEs, just as in other countries except Japan poor salaryen with an Elementary level of English are not usually forced to take TOEIC.
The latest Nova news, btw, is that another small chain is going to reopen 30 branches of the original 900 but won’t be taking on the responsibility of teaching any of the old students- perhaps understandably, as the money those students paid has now disappeared. Understandable, but not a hugely positive development…
November 10th, 2007 at 6:49 am
I don’t follow what you mean about TOEIC - the article you linked to does not mention TOEIC at all. ETS (which is mentioned) also does TOEFL, a major exam taken not just by salarymen with poor English, but by all manner of people wishing to study or live abroad. Japan performs third worst in the whole of Asia in TOEFL. Only Laos and North Korea do worse.
November 10th, 2007 at 8:03 am
Good point about TOEFL, but again taking the scores of all the people who do that or any other exam as a proof of the general level of English in that country makes no sense at all when the types of people who would choose to take those exams are different in each country. For example, if people are rich enough to take those exams more often in the hope of getting lucky instead of waiting until there level was high enough that they are sure to pass even if they have a long day, the marks for that country are likely to be lower. And visa versa if the only people who can afford to take the test at all in a developing country are the rich elite and so not representative of the state school system.
Also, if people in a certain country who don’t really need or use a language take it anyway for reasons such as being forced to by their companies, again that would bring the marks down.
That means that comparing scores for TOEFL or TOEIC in this way only compares the scores of people who choose to or have to take the test. If you wanted to use one of those tests as a real comparison of the general levels of English in two countries, what you would have to do is take a random selection of 1000 people off the street in each country and make them take the test. Although Japan would still hardly shine, I find it difficult to imagine they would come under Vietnam, for example, in such a test.
I feel a “Is the level of English in Japan really that bad” post coming on…
November 11th, 2007 at 1:44 am
Then there is the whole TOEIC/TOEFL is evil and misused argument that invalidates using scores to indicate levels of general populations.
November 11th, 2007 at 11:00 pm
I’ve never heard the word ‘evil’ used about TOEIC before, but having just been to a workshop with a TOEIC textbook writer who also writes items for ETS who had not a single good thing to say about the test I can see how some might see it as the work of the TEFL anti-Christ…