English-medium universities around the world face real challenges in
ensuring that incoming students have the language and literacy skills
they need to cope with the demands of their degree programmes. One
response has been a variety of institutional initiatives to assess
students after admission, in order to identify those with significant
needs and advise them on how to enhance their academic language ability.
This volume brings together papers from Australia, Canada, Hong Kong,
New Zealand, Oman, South Africa and the United States, written by
language assessment specialists who discuss issues in the design and
implementation of these post-admission assessments in their own
institutions. A major theme running through the book is the need to
evaluate the validity of such assessments not just on their technical
quality but on their impact, in terms of giving students access to
effective means of developing their language skills and ultimately
enhancing their academic achievement.