This short Q&A aims to provide insight into how test development and psychometric researchers at CAL identify biased items and prevent sensitive topics from appearing on CAL’s language proficiency assessments. 

The document addresses the importance of ensuring that language proficiency assessments are bias-free, and the steps that are taken to ensure that tests measure students’ language proficiency in a way that is fair to students who are diverse across language, culture, ethnicity, gender, and physical ability. These considerations help ensure that CAL’s assessments are fair, valid, and reliable.