TY - JOUR
T1 - Interpreting the relationships between TOEFL iBT scores and GPA
T2 - Language proficiency, policy, and profiles
AU - Ginther, April
AU - Yan, Xun
N1 - We would like to thank the Provost’s Office and the Office of Enrollment Management at Purdue University for their invitation to examine the data included in this study. We are particularly grateful to Joe Potts, the Associate Dean of International Programs when the study began, and to Mike Brzezinski, the Dean of the Office of International Students and Scholars for his interest and assistance from start to finish. We greatly appreciate Purdue program administrators’ willingness to allow careful examination of the use and interpretation of language proficiency test scores for international undergraduate admissions purposes. We thank the three anonymous reviewers and our editor, Carol Chapelle, for the comments, queries, and assistance provided to revise and improve our original submission. Any errors that remain are our own.
PY - 2018/4/1
Y1 - 2018/4/1
N2 - This study examines the predictive validity of the TOEFL iBT with respect to academic achievement as measured by the first-year grade point average (GPA) of Chinese students at Purdue University, a large, public, Research I institution in Indiana, USA. Correlations between GPA, TOEFL iBT total and subsection scores were examined on 1990 mainland Chinese students enrolled across three academic years (N2011 = 740, N2012 = 554, N2013 = 696). Subsequently, cluster analyses on the three cohorts’ TOEFL subsection scores were conducted to determine whether different score profiles might help explain the correlational patterns found between TOEFL subscale scores and GPA across the three student cohorts. For the 2011 and 2012 cohorts, speaking and writing subscale scores were positively correlated with GPA; however, negative correlations were observed for listening and reading. In contrast, for the 2013 cohort, the writing, reading, and total subscale scores were positively correlated with GPA, and the negative correlations disappeared. Results of cluster analyses suggest that the negative correlations in the 2011 and 2012 cohorts were associated with a distinctive Reading/Listening versus Speaking/Writing discrepant score profile of a single Chinese subgroup. In 2013, this subgroup disappeared in the incoming class because of changes made to the University’s international undergraduate admissions policy. The uneven score profile has important implications for admissions policy, the provision of English language support, and broader effects on academic achievement.
AB - This study examines the predictive validity of the TOEFL iBT with respect to academic achievement as measured by the first-year grade point average (GPA) of Chinese students at Purdue University, a large, public, Research I institution in Indiana, USA. Correlations between GPA, TOEFL iBT total and subsection scores were examined on 1990 mainland Chinese students enrolled across three academic years (N2011 = 740, N2012 = 554, N2013 = 696). Subsequently, cluster analyses on the three cohorts’ TOEFL subsection scores were conducted to determine whether different score profiles might help explain the correlational patterns found between TOEFL subscale scores and GPA across the three student cohorts. For the 2011 and 2012 cohorts, speaking and writing subscale scores were positively correlated with GPA; however, negative correlations were observed for listening and reading. In contrast, for the 2013 cohort, the writing, reading, and total subscale scores were positively correlated with GPA, and the negative correlations disappeared. Results of cluster analyses suggest that the negative correlations in the 2011 and 2012 cohorts were associated with a distinctive Reading/Listening versus Speaking/Writing discrepant score profile of a single Chinese subgroup. In 2013, this subgroup disappeared in the incoming class because of changes made to the University’s international undergraduate admissions policy. The uneven score profile has important implications for admissions policy, the provision of English language support, and broader effects on academic achievement.
KW - Academic success
KW - Chinese students
KW - TOEFL iBT
KW - language policy
KW - predictive validity
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85043600189&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85043600189&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1177/0265532217704010
DO - 10.1177/0265532217704010
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85043600189
SN - 0265-5322
VL - 35
SP - 271
EP - 295
JO - Language Testing
JF - Language Testing
IS - 2
ER -