Abstract
Standardized evaluation to measure people’s language proficiency is a more common practice in the current socio-educative context. Costa Rica is not the exception. The University of Costa Rica and the Ministry of Education have been working to create and use different instruments to different internal and external populations. This paper describes the context of the first language proficiency test to high school students to measure reading and listening comprehension through a computer-based exam. Besides, this paper describes the main theoretical concepts to design instruments for standardized evaluation. On the other hand, it shows the most important results of the test taken by 55143 students all over the country based on the type of the institution in 2019. The results reflect that most of the students are placed in the A2 band of the Common European Framework of References for Languages. However, the tendency of experimental bilingual and private high schools is different from those public and technical ones. It is a must that the Ministry of Education goes on with this practice. Likewise, the two other language skills must be included gradually, and a certification test in the future should be implemented.
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