The path to professionalism

Abstract This paper outlines the changing functions of language testing and assessment from the era of the White Australia policy to the present day. Key contributors to the academic and professional status of the field are identified along with influential tests and assessment frameworks emerging from particular policy contexts. Attention is drawn to the expanding scope of the discipline, which now encompasses diverse domains of language use and demonstrates a growing social consciousness. Australian accomplishments in language testing and assessment are now recognized both locally and internationally as central to the field of applied linguistics and as playing a critical contribution to fairness and equity in the broader educational and political context.