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ACS held a 4 day Training Institute for the World Language teachers, French and Arabic, in collaboration with the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Language (ACTFL), to receive training in the Oral Proficiency Interview (OPI). It is the global assessment procedure most commonly used in the United States for measuring oral proficiency in a World language. The OPI institute trained faculty on eliciting speech samples to determine which one of 10 different proficiency levels a student is at. This helps the faculty to more accurately determine student placement, monitor the progress students are making during the year and to help teachers design their own curriculum and assessment tools for their class.

In order for the faculty to ‘practice’ the OPI, a group of adults and students, with varying degrees of proficiency, volunteered to be interviewed. The faculty used the different responses to determine each volunteers’ proficiency level and discussed how the interviewer did while interviewing the subject. Helping ‘train’ the teachers were the following students: Laiba Rashid, Yasmin Zaraket, Yasmina Al Amir, Thomas Bouri, Ayk Partiyan, Reem Saab, Delaney Livingston, Jenna Livingston and Raneem Mohammad.

The OPI training opens the door for a great learning opportunity for the WL teachers. The training provides the foundation for a certificate as an OPI Tester and many of the teachers decided to pursue.

Whether for students or faculty, school never stops at ACS.