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LCC International University > News and Events archive > Open Lecture with Dr. Betty Lanteigne

Open Lecture with Dr. Betty Lanteigne

2020-01-21

Speaker:
Betty Lanteigne - a Fulbright Dissertation Fellow and David L. Boren Fellow, she holds a PhD in linguistics from Indiana University of Pennsylvania and has taught in the USA and the Middle East for 25 years. She has given numerous teacher workshops on language assessment in numerous countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, and North America.

Event description:

A presentation of findings from the 4th conference jointly organized by the Council of Europe and the Association of Language Testers in Europe: Achieving Equal Opportunities for All Migrants Through Learning and Assessment.

From the COE:
“The Council of Europe’s primary aim is to create a common democratic and legal area throughout the continent, ensuring respect for human rights, democracy and the rule of law. All the Council of Europe’s actions are shaped by these values and by an enduring concern with social inclusion, social cohesion and respect for diversity; hence its interest in the linguistic integration of adult migrants.

“As part of its continuing work the Council of Europe launched the project on the Linguistic Integration of Adult Migrants (LIAM) in 2007. The LIAM project aims to support member states in the development of coherent and effective policies and to encourage them to review existing policies in keeping with shared Council of Europe values and principles.”

From 2002 to 2018, ALTE developed and administered four surveys about the fairness of language test use for evaluation of migrants in the European context. In addition to individual effects, there are societal consequences to language tests which are used as instruments of language policy decisions. The COE explains the focus of the conference on social knowledge and language skill: “For the past two decades a growing number of European countries have introduced language and knowledge of society (KoS) requirements as part of their immigration and integration policies. While rarely practiced before year 2000, most countries in Europe today have formal language and KoS-requirements for citizenship, residency and/or entrance to the country. As the findings of these reports reveal, however, the actual level of language proficiency required varies considerably from one country to the next, as does the degree to which states provide migrants with learning opportunities through tailored and free-of-charge language and KoS-courses.”

“The conference [highlighted] challenges for Council of Europe member states, in terms of human rights and integration of migrants and refugees with respect to language skill and knowledge of society. Also discussed [were] implications of COE requirements in Europe.”

The event is open to everyone.

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