The Staellinika Greek Language Platform for the Diaspora, an initiative of the General Secretariat for Greeks Abroad and Public Diplomacy at the Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs is pleased to announce the launch of the Staellinika Greek Language Proficiency Test in collaboration with the SNF Centre for Hellenic Studies at Simon Fraser University (SFU), supported by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) and in partnership with the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America.

The Staellinika Language Test is yet another tool in a series of content and software releases that aim to support Greek Language Teaching and Learning in the Diaspora.

Staellinika team has released an online test which addresses the needs of beginner learners in the USA and Canada working towards alignment with North American curricula on Foreign Language learning specifically for Greek. Referring to the initiative, the General Secretary of Greeks Abroad and Public Diplomacy, Ioannis Chrysoulakis, underlined: “We work for the continuous implementation and upgrading of the Staellinika platform, an initiative of the General Secretariat of Greeks Abroad and Public Diplomacy of the Hellenic Ministry of Foreign Affairs. This has become a pioneering and innovative tool for learning the Greek Language and it has been widely embraced on all continents by members of the Greek Diaspora as well as foreign learners of Greek. Now, the platform is enriched with an online Greek language proficiency test. These developments demonstrate the platform’s ability to expand its toolbox for the promotion of Greek language learning and serve the learners of Greek consistently.”

Anastasios Koularmanis, the Educational Director for the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America says “Our overall vision is making an impact on learning the Greek language everywhere. We know how big of a problem this is, and we know that through the help of technology we can really make an impact.”

This evaluation tool serves two main functions, firstly as a Greek Proficiency Test, providing a snapshot of the learner’s current knowledge and proficiency in Greek, to be used as a self-assessment tool or by Greek language instructors to determine their teaching goals and strategies. It is also a placement test, determining a learner’s starting point in Staellinika courses, based on their prior knowledge and proficiency in the Greek language.

The Greek Language Test is now available in Beta release which includes learner evaluation in basic learning outcomes, including communication and grammar instructional goals. Future iterations of the tool will provide a more granular evaluation of a student’s language proficiency, based on the four different language competences (reading comprehension, listening comprehension, speaking and writing), as well as expanding the set of learning outcomes. Furthermore, future versions will address more personalization, leveraging the potential of Artificial Intelligence implementation.

The Proficiency Test is available at staellinika.com for no charge thanks to the generous support of the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF).

The test will be available for South America (Spanish and Portuguese Brazilian) later this year.

Photos: Staellinika