ALTE Full Members take a full, active part in the life of the association and have at least one of their tests audited through the Quality Management System resulting in a Q-Mark. 

Benefits of becoming a full member include:

• Use of the ALTE logo
• Physical and digital membership certificate
• Listing on the ALTE website
• Taking part in the ALTE Quality Management and auditing system (at additional cost)
• Following a successful audit, use of the Q-Mark which indicates a recognition of quality of language testing
• Opportunity to host a conference, thus enabling the showcasing of your institution and language tests
• Opportunity to collaborate on projects
• Access to sections of the ALTE website such as the electronic discussion forum
• Invitation to attend ALTE biannual conferences and other events organised for Members
• Reduced delegate rates at specified ALTE events and training seminars (courses)
• The opportunity to receive, via email and post, ALTE communications
• The opportunity to exhibit at appropriate ALTE events
• The opportunity to work in ALTE Special Interest Groups
• Opportunities to build international links through the ALTE network, including those of European institutions
• Opportunities to stand and serve in the Executive and Standing Committees, pending election
• Invitation to attend the ALTE AGM
• Voting rights, e.g. in elections to committees or votes at the AGM

Procedure to become ALTE Full Member

There are 5 main steps to become an ALTE Full Member, which may take some time to complete fully:

1) Become an ALTE Associate Member and get involved!

The standard procedure for an organisation to join ALTE requires becoming an ALTE Associate Member in the first instance. Please visit the page on becoming an ALTE Associate Member for more information about this step, including the application form. 

Organisations should be an Associate Member for a period of three years before applying for full membership and Q-Mark audit of at least one of their tests.

As an Associate Member, staff from the organisation should get actively involved in the life of the association, e.g. by attending ALTE conferences and other events and taking part in projects. This is very important as we very much value meeting you and getting to know you! The Board of Trustees take all this into account when reviewing applications to become an ALTE Full Member. 

2) Check you meet the requirements to be a Full Member 

Before applying for ALTE Full Membership status, please check that your organisation can fulfil all of the following requirements:

• be a legal entity which is legally registered (see Note 1)
• be accountable for the tests which they provide, i.e. are responsible for their own tests
• have read and agreed to the terms of the ALTE constitution
• adhere to ALTE's Principles of Good Practice
• produce tests of the language(s) of the country or region that they are registered in. (See Note 2) They may also produce tests of other languages.
• have provided tests of the language(s) of the country or region that they are registered in for a period of at least five years before applying for an audit, with at least one session per year
• have been an ALTE Associate Member for at least three years before applying for an audit, and have taken part in ALTE events and activities, including the Orientation to ALTE Audit System training session
• have the ALTE Q-Mark for at least one of their tests of the language(s) of the country or region that they are registered in (see Notes 2 and 3), by the time they officially become a Full Member
• actively engage in the life of the Association, e.g promotion of ALTE events and courses; regular attendance at its SIG meetings, workshops and conferences, with at least one representative attending the Annual General meeting (usually held as part of the November conference each year) and at least one representative having attending the Orientation to ALTE Audit System Session (usually held online in October or November) prior to applying for an audit.
• have provided concrete evidence in terms of documentation of professionalism in the language testing field (e.g. research, projects, publications, recognition letters, etc.)
• have their membership application reviewed by the ALTE Board of Trustees to ensure that they meet the stated criteria (see step 3 below)

Notes

1. Applicants for Full Membership should be able to provide valid evidence of their legal status, if required by the Board of Trustees. In case of legal registrations in different countries, Applicants must communicate to ALTE the country they decide to refer on among the ones where they are legally registered.

2. The language of the country/region where they are sited is usually a language that has some sort of official recognition as such. This may be a spoken or signed language. The Board of Trustees will work with the organisation in question to determine if the language fulfils this criterion. Members that have had a resolved audit for a test in the language of their country/region may also request quality audits for any tests of other languages which they provide.

3. Or was a member of ALTE EEIG before the introduction of the Q-Mark in 2008 and is working towards fulfilling the requirements of the quality audit; Members that have had a resolved audit for a test in the language of their country/region may also subsequently request quality audits for any tests of other languages which they provide.

3) Apply for Full Membership and be provisionally approved by ALTE's Board of Trustees

Please check that your organisation fulfils the above criteria, and then request the ALTE Full Membership application form from the ALTE Secretariat.

Complete the application form, and write a formal letter of intent addressed to the ALTE Secretary-General. The letter should be signed by the legal representative of the organisation (the person with legal authority to enter into contracts). More details of what to include in the letter will be found in the ALTE Full Membership application form. 

The above documents shall be reviewed by the ALTE Board of Trustees, during one of the bi-annual Board meetings. (Please check with the ALTE Secretariat if you wish to know when the Board meeting will take place). The Board of Trustees will decide if the organisation is suitable to join the Association as ALTE Full Member and undergo an ALTE audit. It may be that the Trustees determine that further work should be done by your organisation to improve the quality of your assessments first, which may be obtained through the Services Unit. 

If the application is approved by the Board of Trustees, the organisation becomes a candidate for full membership, but is not yet a Full Member. It can start preparing the documentation in order to undergo the quality (Q-Mark) audit, assisted by the ALTE Secretariat. 

4) Apply and undergo an ALTE audit (of at least one of the organisation’s examinations)

A crucial part of the application to become an ALTE Full Member is to undergo an ALTE audit for at least one of the organisation's exams.  The first audit must be for a test of one of the languages of the country or region the organisation is registered in. This is to fulfil ALTE's objective of 'sustaining diversity' in terms of multilingualism. For more information about how the Q-Mark audit system works, read the information about the Q-Mark. Detailed information on the ALTE auditing process and its different stages is available in the ALTE Procedures for Auditing. Please note that this stage may take some time, depending on the readiness of the organisation for the audit. 

The ALTE Quality Assurance checklists (available in Resources) may also be helpful as they cover aspects of exams audited - test construction; test administration; marking, grading and results; test analysis and post-examination review. The checklists can be used as a self-assessment tool and it is recommended that they are completed by all organisations who consider applying for ALTE audits (the information about this part of the process can also be found in Section 5 of the PFA document mentioned above).

5) Become an ALTE Full Member

Once the ALTE audit is completed with the outcome ‘Resolved’, the organisation will need to sign the Membership Agreement to officially become an ALTE Full Member. 

After signing the Membership Agreement, the new ALTE Full Member is allocated a unique Q–mark reference and logo. This is the quality indicator which member organisations can use to show that their examination(s) have passed an ALTE audit. For full details on how the Q–mark can be used, please refer to the Q-Mark Guide.

The organisation will then be invited to prepare a small presentation about their own organisation during the following ALTE AGM or Members' Meeting. This will help other ALTE members understand better how the new organisation works and the type of language exams that they work with. The organisation will also need to provide a short description of the institution to include in the ALTE website.

The annual fee for ALTE Full Members is €2,250. The ALTE annual subscription fees are payable each January upon receipt of the invoice from the ALTE Secretariat.

ALTE then looks forward to continue working well with you for the promotion of quality language assessment.

If you have any queries about this procedure or any of the steps above, please contact the ALTE Secretariat (secretariat@alte.org).

Note: transfer of membership is usually not permitted - however see the Rules on Transfer of Membership.