By Yoon Seong-hoon
People spend their money to take the TOEIC, or Test of English for International Communication, for different reasons.
The main one perhaps is to put the score on a resume. However, it does not make sense that people with excellent English abilities should have to take TOEIC to apply for a company. There are many Korean students who have lived in English-speaking countries for many years, and so speak English fluently. But these students are still forced to take the TOEIC to apply for a company here in Korea.
Some students with high TOEIC scores also have to take the exam again if two years have passed since they last did the test. Many students keep developing their English skills, so their English generally keeps improving. The test becomes quite meaningless for those with high scores because they simply take the exam again to confirm their score.
Some Korean companies require employees to take TOEIC to improve their English skills or to simply make them study English. What a waste of time and money. TOEIC is neither the best mechanism for improving someone's English ability nor a favorable option for studying English itself, but people are forced to study it in order to take the test again. It makes employees waste their money by taking a meaningless test.
Many students in Korea take TOEIC to see their score. Many of them take the exam again and again until they get a score higher than 900. A high TOEIC score should not be the purpose of studying English. Why should our English skills be evaluated by numbers? Why don't we just focus on improving our general knowledge of English, such as speaking?
TOEIC is not the best option for evaluating someone's English skills, but the preferred one for both companies and job applicants. It is comfortable for companies, because the test score is easy to measure. It is good for job applicants, because it is a cheaper option than other exams such as TOEFL, Test of English as a Foreign Language.
However, with some changes, we can use our money more wisely. If companies start seeing TOEIC as an option and allow job applicants to include their English study experience on resumes, those with good English skills do not need to take the test.
Secondly, if companies remove the TOEIC score deadline, people will not need to take the test again simply to get their scores back. Currently, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade takes the TOEIC score as an option and does not have any time limited approval of scores. On its application forms there is space for applicants with no proven language scores to write down their language skills in detail. This is done by a ministry that needs the most competitive English speakers, showing other companies there is no good argument to keep their current conservative system.
It is not only Korean students who have to take the TOEIC for jobs. Chinese students are also forced to take the test to apply for a job in China. European students are also taking the exam so as to put their score on their curricular vitaes.
I hope these people are able to spend their money in a more meaningful and wise way. If we could have used the money we spent taking TOEIC on people in the third world, their poverty might now have ended.
The writer is studying business administration at Korea University in Seoul. He can be reached at okjacky@empal.com.