An Interview with APPLE Lecture Speaker Professor Alister Cumming

On April 11, 2014, the TESOL/AL Web Journal (represented by Rongchan Lin, Yuna Seong, and Catherine Box) had the opportunity to sit down with Professor Alister Cumming, guest speaker for the 2014 Applied Linguistics & Language Education (APPLE) Lecture Series, hosted annually by the TESOL/Applied Linguistics Programs at Teachers College, Columbia University. Professor Cumming was kind enough to take the time, during a very busy day, to speak about his research, his work on assessing writing, his thoughts on dynamic assessment, and his advice for new scholars working in the TESOL/AL fields. Professor Cumming is professor in the Centre for Educational Research on Languages and Literacies (CERLL) at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto. His research and teaching focus on writing in second languages, language assessment, language program evaluation and policies, and research methods. His most recent books include Adolescent Literacies in a Multicultural Context (2012, Routledge), A Synthesis of Research on Second Language Writing in English (with Ilona Leki & Tony Silva, 2008, Routledge), and Goals for Academic Writing (2006, John Bejamins). Professor Cumming is currently the Executive Director of Language Learning, a journal he edited in the 1990s. For the past five years he has chaired the TOEFL Committee of Examiners at Educational Testing Service in Princeton. He received his PhD from the University of Toronto in 1988, MA and BA from the University of British Columbia in 1979 and 1975 respectively, and an honorary doctorate from the University of Copenhagen in 2009. From 2014 to 2017 he will hold a Changjiang Scholarship at Beijing Foreign Studies University. We thank Professor Cumming for his participation in a lively interview. We also thank Fred Tsutagawa for videotaping and Dr. Kirby Grabowski for coordinating the APPLE Lecture Series Interview