As promised, here the more useful but less interesting list of dates and events, to accompany my list of more interesting but less useful stats and my review of the book they all came from.

1857 – Founding of the University of Cambridge Local Exams Syndicate, local meaning exams not only held in the university and syndicate meaning the committee in charge of this.

14 December 1858 – 370 candidates take the first UCLES exams in Birmingham, Brighton, Bristol, Cambridge, Grantham, Liverpool, London and Norwich.

1913 – The first CPE (Cambridge Proficiency in English) test, with three candidates, apparently none of whom passed. It cost three pounds (107 pounds at 2011 prices) and took 12 hours. It included two translation papers (from and to French and German), a two-hour essay, a three hour paper on English literature, a ninety-minute paper on phonetics, a thirty-minute dictation, reading aloud, and a conversation

1934 – The number of people taking the CPE each year finally goes past double figures, over 20 years after it was launched.

1939 – 700 people take the CPE.

1939 – Introduction of the LCE (Lower Certificate in English), later to become “the global leader in English language exams” (pg 28) and become the FCE.

1941 – Signing of the first agreement between UCLES and the British Council, to develop and oversee the Cambridge exams in English as a foreign language.

December 1945 – DES (Diploma in English Studies) introduced at a level higher than CPE and taken by 16 candidates in three countries (Egypt, Uruguay and UK).

1947 – 6,283 people take Cambridge EFL exams (LCE 4208, CPE 2028 and DES 47).

1953 – 53 people in a staff photo of the whole of UCLES.

1955 – 20,388 people take Cambridge EFL exams (LCE 14,307, CPE 6002, DES 79), up 300% from 1947.

1960 – 8000 people take the CPE (up from 700 in 1939).

1965 – 44,094 people take Cambridge EFL exams.

1975 – Cambridge LCE renamed First Certificate in English (FCE) and standardised with CPE to have the same five papers as at present.

1975 – Translation in the CPE exam becomes optional.

1976 – 66,061 people take Cambridge EFL exams (including 139 for DES).

March 1980 – First PET (Preliminary English Test) test (with restricted entry)

1980 – The ELTS (later IELTS) test is held with six subject-based subtests – Life Sciences, Social Studies, Physical Sciences, Technology, Medicine, and General Academic, plus Non-Academic.

Early eighties – Authentic listening recordings made for possible use in tests such as unscripted conversations, but quickly abandoned and replaced by working with the BBC, with a mix of authentic radio programmes and special recordings of actors from the BBC Rep (which will be why I’ve recognised voices from the Archers).

1981 – 4000 ELTS candidates.

1982 – Exam papers secretly smuggled in from Montevideo to Argentina due to the Falklands War.

1985 – 10,000 ELTS candidates.

1985 – Number of permanent staff at UCLES reaches 238.

1986 – 44,000 of 121,000 FCE students are Greek

1986 – 129,293 people take Cambridge EFL exams (FCE 95019, CPE 26819, PET 7385, DES 70) fewer than 2000 candidates being in Asia and Africa and 11420 in Latin America, with 1050 oral examiners and 270 examiners working on writing.

1987 – RSA Examinations Board (merged with UCLES the next year) separated from the Royal Society of Arts.

1988 – 170,832 take the Main Suite exams (Diploma, CPE, FCE and PET) – up 32% on 1986. 3400 people take the RSA CUEFL (Communicative Use of English as a Foreign Language) exams, and 923 people take the new CEELT (Cambridge Examination in English for Language Teachers).

1988 – 10 or so staff under the new Director of the EFL Division at UCLES.

1988 – New EFL Division of UCLES responsible for 150,000 candidates a year (compared to 500,000 a year for TOEFL).

1988 – RSA EFL exams merged with those of Cambridge.

1989 – End of ELTS, replaced by IELTS with only three subject-specific modules rather than six and the non-academic test replaced by the General Module.

1989 – The optional translation part of the CPE is removed .

1980s – The first standardisation tapes and videos for oral examiners.

1990 – Certificate in English for International Business and Trade.

1990 – 228,581 people take Cambridge EFL exams (FCE 158953, CPE 43302, PET 25998, DES 328), 77% up on 1986.

Late 1990 – Founding of ALTE (Association of Language Testers in Europe) during a meeting in Barcelona.

1992 – Cambridge Learner Corpus.

Early 1990s – More than 10,000 approved Cambridge Oral Examiners.

1991 – 60% of the 270,000 Cambridge EFL exam candidates enter through British Council offices.

1991 – CAE (Cambridge Advanced English) is launched as the first Cambridge exam with paired candidates in the speaking, later spread to the other Cambridge exams.

1992 – The EFL Division of UCLES gets its own fax machine.

1993 – The first BEC (Business English Certificates) launched in October and taken in December, both in China. It had been introduced in response to an enquiry from China’s NEEA (National Education Examinations Authority), which acted as the official distribution channel for international exams such as IELTS and TOEFL.

1994 – BEC2.

1994 – Introduction of KET (Key English Test) at a level lower than PET.

1995 – Subject-specific papers replaced by single Academic Reading and Academic Writing modules in IELTS.

1995 – Start of the Studies in Language Testing (SiLT) series of books, published by Cambridge University Press.

1996 – FCE changes to have paired candidates in the speaking (originally introduced in 1991 in the new CAE) and equal weighting for the five papers.

1996 – BEC3.

1996 – CTEFLA becomes RSA Cambridge CELTA, mainly to get rid of the word “foreign” in the name.

1996 – DES (Diploma of English Studies, higher level than CPE) disappears after nearly 50 years of candidate numbers never rising about a few hundred per year.

1996 – UCLES starts administering the Oxford-ARELS listening and speaking tests.

1996 – 426,674 people take Cambridge EFL Main Suite exams (FCE 251599, CPE 64302, PET 50838, CAE 41764, KET 18171) .

1999 – 97250 people take IELTS.

1997 – Cambridge Young Learners English (YLE) tests introduced into China.

1997 – “Statutory regulation of ESOL examinations was introduced shortly after the first national exams regulator, the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA), was set up” (pg 197)

1997 – BULATS (Business Language Testing Service) exams in business English, French, German and Spanish set up in collaboration with Instituto Cervantes etc.

1998 – Number of UCLES EFL HQ staff reach 65 (from 9 in 1988).

1999 – Revision of CAE.

End of 1990s – 1300 Cambridge exam centres in 135 countries.

2000 – Computer-based BULATS.

2001 – IELTS revision.

2001 – RSA Cambridge CELTA loses RSA part of its name (this having been just a Cambridge owned brand name since the two exam boards merged in 1988).

November 2001 – The last Oxford-ARELS tests (administered by Cambridge) held.

2004 – Cambridge In-service Certificate in English Language Teaching (ICELT) replaces the Certificate for Overseas Teachers of English (COTE).

2005 – Launch of the Skills for Life exams (“Cambridge ESOL quickly came to dominate this new market for ESOL in the UK” – pg 199).

2005 – UCLES renamed Cambridge Assessment and UCLES EFL changes name to Cambridge ESOL.

May 2005 – Cambridge TKT (Teaching Knowledge Test).

2006 – CEELT (Cambridge Examination in English for Language Teachers) phased out to make way for the TKT.

2006 – ILEC (International Legal English Certificate)

2007 – ICFE (International Certificate in Financial English)

January 2007 – The number of US universities recognising IELTS reaches 1000.

2009 – “for Schools” versions of exams (FCE for Schools etc) introduced.

2012 – Nearly 4 million people take Cambridge exams, 1.8 million people take IELTS in 2700 centres in 130 countries.

2013 – Cambridge ESOL changes name to Cambridge English Language Assessment.

2013 – CPE revised, including reducing it to four papers.

2013 – Cambridge take over the Australian OET (Occupational English Test) medical English exam.

2015 – CAE revision, including reduction to four papers like 2013 CPE changes.