All examiners have to be using a system that fills the criteria set out by ICAO.
It's not just a simple case of a teacher coming in and saying yes you are great and then signing you off.
For example....how it is run here is.
I teach an RT course broken into four main areas of learning. Light traffic routine, light traffic non routine, heavy traffic routine and heavy traffic non routine.
All candidates are assessed using a Cambridge University test, which gives us a fairly accurate idea of their overall English level.
Research done by the provider has set a knowledge yardstick between the result of the above and the relationship between that and the subject's RT ability.
Any candidate who falls below that is put into a General Aviation Language Course for ten weeks and then moves to the RT course. If they are assistant controllers or student pilots, I recommend that they finish the Gen courses and go back to either their ATPL notes, Aerodrome course notes or ICAO 051 notes before they go on the RT course so that the procedures and the reasons behind them are fresh in their minds.
Then, after the RT course is done, they sit a proficiency test which consists of RT checks and interviews. These sessions are recorded and marked and sent away to three or sometimes four independent examiners who score them. The backgrounds of the examiners are related to the industry and they are also trained for language testing. They are also not in the same country! They are over 5000 miles away! This is an added bonus as there is no in-house marking.
The four scores through almost twenty parameters are usually very similar and any large discrepancies go through an appeal system. This to my knowledge however has not been required yet.
The time extension was given purely from the instructors requests as we just can't get everyone through the systems on time.
Any new controllers being employed over here will have to be ICAO compliant before sitting in a tower or on a scope.
Assistant controllers are being asked to have at least IELTS 5.5 before joining a cadet program.
Last edited by Farrell; 21st Nov 2007 at 15:28.