News

As of the 1^st of May the English language and e-learning departments of Smart Business Communications have joined the ICB group. Smart has 15 years experience in the development and delivery of Business English training predominantly for the banking and financial sectors in Paris with a team of highly experienced trainers, administrators and IT specialists.

ICB and ICB Europe director Eric Wrobley has been selected to be a member of the French committee to participate in the creation of a new international ISO standard specific to language schools. A first ISO technical workgroup session will take place on the 20^th of May in Beijing.

ICB Europe is 10 years old! December 2009 marks our 10^th anniversary of quality English language training. These first 10 years have been a constant effort to be or become a good language school. The goal of the future is to become excellent.

7. Evaluations

Initial Evaluation

Before each course begins, all participants are evaluated in order to determine their level, needs and objectives. We propose three types of initial evaluations depending on the standards of the client company:

The Basic Evaluation:
- Needs Analysis: utilization of our on-line tool (www.icbeurope.com) to define the needs and objectives of the course
- Grammar Test made up of 100 questions taken on-line covering grammatical structures and verb tenses as well as professional and general vocabulary
- Test of Oral Expression and Comprehension carried out by telephone to evaluate the speaking and listening skills of participants
Duration: generally the evaluation lasts one hour with 15 minutes for the Needs Analysis, 30 minutes for the Grammar Test, and 15 minutes for the Oral Interview.

Cost: Evaluations leading on to training courses are not billed. Evaluations without training: 25 € HT.
The Face to Face Evaluation: the Oral Interview is done face to face rather than on the telephone while the Needs Analysis and the Grammar Test are done on-line

Cost: 50 € HT per person for an evaluation followed by training. Evaluations without training: 75 € HT

Linguistic Audits: an initial meeting is held between the ICB Europe training manager and the manager of the people requesting training to better identify their operational needs and requirements. A tailor-made evaluation is then developed according to the professional activities of the people being tested. The results are compiled into a report to the manager indicating the language skills in English of the team along with a proposal to improve them.

Cost: given upon request

QUALITY EVALUATIONS

After 3 sessions and again in the middle of a course, all participants are encouraged to respond to a questionnaire on the ICB Europe site which checks on the efficient management of the course and satisfaction. In order to optimize the learning process, modifications are made to the program if necessary. The client receives a copy of all questionnaires along with satisfaction statistics. A third questionnaire is filled in at the end of the course.

FINAL EVALUATIONS

At the end of each lesson cycle, participants are evaluated by their trainer in order to determine their current level and track progress relating to their objectives as well as identify future needs.

TOEIC

ICB Europe has been an “Authorised TOEIC Test Centre” since the year 2000. Our lesson cycles often end with a TOEIC test (or BRIDGE for low level students).

RECRUITMENT TESTING

To help our clients avoid the costly error of hiring someone without the necessary level in English we offer a recruitment testing service comprising an oral interview, a test of written expression and a grammar test. The results are reported within 24 hours.

Cost: 90 € HT per applicant