September 20, 2016

IELTS Phase Out

In our Year-in-Review meeting this May, you overwhelmingly voted to stop accepting the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) English proficiency exam. In response to your vote, we are phasing out acceptance of the IELTS; IELTS with a test session date after November 1, 2016 will not be accepted.

We ask you to help us assist your prospective applicants during this transition period:

• If you mention the IELTS exam or English proficiency requirements on your departmental website, please add the following note: “We are phasing out usage of IELTS. IELTS with a test session date after November 1, 2016 will not be accepted.” We have updated Memo 8 and Memo 15 with this information.

• IELTS has been removed as a test type from the “Report English Proficiency Scores” section of the online application so you may be contacted by applicants who want to “self-report” an IELTS. Please let your applicants know they can still electronically report the official test score by following instructions in the FAQs (Tests > Will you accept my IELTS test?). The available test types in the online application are TOEFL and TOEFL iBT.

We will continue to work with your applicants who are having difficulties sending their IELTS scores electronically to UW. Please forward e-mails to uwgrad@uw.edu. Thank you.