Professor Cyril Weir (OBE)

Professor Cyril Weir founded CRELLA in 2005 when he took up The Powdrill Chair in Second Language Acquisition and led CRELLA until 2015. In 2015 Cyril was awarded an OBE in honour of his services to English language assessment.

Cyril authored a wide range of educational publications including more than 20 books on language testing and language programme evaluation in addition to editing many more collected works. During his tenure, Cyril was made a Follow of the Academy of Social Sciences and in 2014 was awarded the Cambridge/ILTA distinguished achievement award for language testing.

Cyril’s most important legacy is his contribution to the development of the Socio-Cognitive Framework. The framework has been extensively used across a range of test development and validation projects and continues to provide the theoretical and practical basis for language assessments across the world.

Dr Aynur Ismayilli Karakoç

Aynur Ismayilli Karakoç worked at CRELLA from 2022 to 2023 as a KTP Associate/Language Assessment Developer.

At CRELLA, she collaborated with colleagues on the BC EnglishScore test validation project. Aynur's main research interests include research and development of language assessments as well as integrated reading-writing assessments. She's also interested in rater training, development and validation of rating scales, test-takers’ cognitive processes and task representations, and assessment practices in EAP and EMI contexts.

Dr Daniel M K Lam

Daniel M K Lam worked at CRELLA from 2016 to 2021 as a Post-doctoral Research Fellow and then Lecturer in Language Learning and Assessment.

At CRELLA, he led and collaborated with colleagues on research projects on international English language tests. Daniel's main research interests include interactional competence, learning-oriented assessment and the role of feedback, and the use of language tests for admissions and professional purposes. He is passionate about Conversation Analysis as a research methodology. Daniel's work can be found in the journals Applied Linguistics, Language Testing, Language Assessment Quarterly, and in IELTS online research reports, Cambridge English Research Notes and ETS research reports. He has also delivered talks and training workshops to an extensive range of audiences across contexts such as China, Egypt, Germany, Japan, Switzerland and Ukraine. Daniel now works for the University of Glasgow as Lecturer in TESOL, but we continue to collaborate with him on various projects.

Dr John Field

Dr John Field worked as a Reader in Cognitive Approaches to Second Language Acquisition. His background was in Psycholinguistics, with special reference to first and second language listening.

John's role at CRELLA consisted of research, consultancy and PhD supervision relating to the testing of L2 listening; he also provided advice to colleagues on the role of cognitive processes in the projects they undertook. John inducted new research students: introducing them to PhD planning and the structure of a thesis.

Professor Liz Hamp-Lyons

Liz Hamp-Lyons joined CRELLA as Professor in English Language Assessment in 2007 and retired in 2020. She received her PhD in Applied Linguistics and Language Testing at the University of Edinburgh in 1986, and worked in universities in Scotland, the USA (Illinois, Michigan and Colorado), Iran, Malaysia, Australia, England, and Hong Kong, where she was Chair Professor and Head of English and Director of the Asian Centre for Language Assessment Research (ACLAR) from 1996-2003. She also served as an Honorary Professor at the University of Hong Kong, and Special Professor at the University of Nottingham.

Liz was the Editor of Assessing Writing from 2002-2016 and was the founding Editor of the Journal of English for Academic Purposes, which she co-edited until 2015. She was a Founding Member and later President of the International Language Testing Association (ILTA) and Expert Member of EALTA. Among her many publications, her books included Study Writing (with Ben Heasley), Assessing the Portfolio with Bill Condon and the edited collections Assessing Second Language Writing in Academic Contexts and Assessing the English Language Writing of Chinese Learners of English (with Jin Yan), which was published posthumously in 2022.

Professor Stephen Bax

Professor Stephen Bax worked at CRELLA from 2009 to 2015 as Reader and then Professor. Stephen’s most representative work at CRELLA is the use of eye tracking technology to research reading and reading tests. His 2013 article in Language Testing, the first article on eye tracking in the journal, won the 2014 TESOL Distinguished Research Award. He has done extensive consultancy work around the world for the British Council and for publishers, and acted as book reviewer for CUP, OUP and other major publishers. Stephen has published extensively in the fields of teacher education, CALL and ICT, and areas of discourse.

Professor Roger Hawkey

Professor Roger Hawkey worked at CRELLA from 2007 to 2016 first as Senior Research Fellow and then Visiting Professor. At CRELLA, he participated in externally-funded research projects and supervised PhD students. His main research and consultancy interests include language test impact study, evaluation and validation, and he has published regularly in these areas. Roger is also interested in learning techniques, training approaches, educational policy and curriculum design materials development.

Representative publications of Roger include the books A Modular Approach to Testing English Language Skills (2004), Impact Theory and Practice (2006), and Key Issues and Recurring Themes in Developing the First Certificate in English and Certificate in Advanced English Exams (2009).

Professor Michael Milanovic

Michael was a Visiting Professor at CRELLA. He has been involved in language education and assessment since 1977. He has an M.A. in Applied Linguistics and a Ph.D. in the same field focusing on performance-based assessment gained in 1988 entitled: The construction and validation of a performance-based battery of English language progress tests. (Institute of Education, University of London).

He has over 30 years' academic, practical and managerial experience in this field. He has managed a wide range of projects related to operational issues, the development of new examinations and procedures, research and most aspects of business management and development. His personal expertise includes strategic leadership, qualitative and quantitative research and the development of rigorous quality management systems. He has led major projects in collaboration with ministries and universities around the world, including Chile, China, Colombia, Egypt, France, Spain and Vietnam and with the European Commission.

Since retiring from Cambridge English Language Assessment, he has become involved in a number of projects both academic and business oriented. He is a Senior Advisor to the National Educational Examinations Authority in China, part of the Ministry of Education and is also a Senior Advisor to the Cambridge Malaysia Education Development Trust, funded by the government of Malaysia.

Dr Joanna Bhatti

Dr Joanna Bhatti was an associate member of CRELLA and worked as Lecturer at the Department of Language and Communication from 2013 to 2016. She also completed her PhD at CRELLA in 2014. Her research interests include descriptive and theoretical pragmatics with a focus on cross-cultural issues, and within language testing, the role of intercultural parameters in defining English Language proficiency levels, especially in relation to the assessment of high-level language proficiency for study in academic contexts or for employment in professional contexts. Areas of Joanna’s teaching expertise include aspects of communication and culture, intercultural communication, the pragmatics of business communication, and teaching English as a foreign language.