The Yunus Emre Institute has launched a “Turkish Proficiency Exam” (TYS) project in order to develop an exam that can assess Turkish language based on modern testing and assessment methods, assessing all aspects of student skills with a standard and international validity.

With this project, it is aimed to test proficiency of Turkish as a foreign language with an exam appropriate to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. It is hoped that a positive step is taken towards making the Turkish language a competitor among other languages.

General aspects concerning the Turkish Proficiency Exam being prepared is as follows: 

• The exam will be a test of proficiency (summative test).
• The exam will be for those over the age of 16. 
• “The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages” will be taken as a basis for the level indicators and limitations. 
• In the first stage, the exam will be designed as a paper-based exam that can be adapted to a computer-based exam. 
• It is not possible to assess levels A1 to C2 in one exam due to time constraints. For this reason, the exam will be designed to assess the “Reading” and “Listening” skills in B1-C1 and the “Speaking” and “Writing” skills will be assessed in A2-C2. 
• There will be 40 multiple choice questions in the Reading section.
• In the Writing section there will be 2 questions which will use a holistic rubric scoring key. 
• In the Listening section, all students in the exam room will be played the questions from the same CD player and the answers will be scored with a multiple choice optically read answering sheet. 
• In the Speaking section, a 2 or 3 stage speaking test will be administered. 
• The process of working to be followed will be based on basic test development steps. 
• The content and implementation of the exam will follow the standards established by the international accreditation agency ALTE recognised by the European Union. 
• The exam for preliminary and main courses will be prepared by the Yunus Emre Institute and the Yunus Emre Institute will cover any unforeseen costs to be incurred by persons taking the exam or the location of the exam.
• The preliminary and main administrations will be prepared and their security and validity will be ensured, after which the patterns on the booklets will be prepared. The process will end with a sufficient number of questions developed and recorded at a single source (database).

The exam will take place periodically at the Institute headquarters, the Yunus Emre Cultural Centres abroad and cooperating universities.

* The first exam will take place on 18th January 2014. You can apply to Yunus Emre Cultural Centers to take the exam.