Assessing the Legal English Skills of Italian Lawyers in a Perspective of Lifelong Learning - The EFLIT End-of-course Exam and University Testing: An Attempt to Cater for Real World Needs

In 2006 the Law Faculty of Parma University (Italy) launched EFLIT (English for Law and International Transactions), a postgraduate training project for professionals in the fields of Law and Economics aimed to improve both their language and legal skills by combining a linguistic (i.e. English for Law) and a content focus (i.e. Law in English). Since then EFLIT has developed into a national project and obtained recognition by professional associations for accreditation purposes in continuous education. This has called for a valid, reliable, standardised end-of-course test which assesses the level reached by participants and is "authentic," i.e. reflects their real needs for English and translates their competence into actual performance. The EFLIT teaching staff carried out a survey in order to identify the participantsʼ specific requirements, and design an exam suitable for both lawyers and accountants and tailored to the needs of professionals working in Italy. The present study outlines the new format of the exam based on the results of the survey, in an attempt to bring together language assessment principles and the participantsʼ professional needs, and compares it to the universityʼs internal test to verify to what extent the latter matches the requirements of the studentsʼ future profession.