Help for Student re: Request for Accommodation due to English as a Second Language

[dlross]

Hello everyone.

I have been in a Zoom call with one of my students for almost two hours (insane!!!!). She is in my Canadian cohort in Calgary. I am in the USA. This woman clearly has a language barrier. English is not her first language; however, she studies hard, and she understands English and can talk in conversations. She has a heavy accent, and it takes her some time to get through the reading, but she just takes more time to read. We are trying to book her for the Core 1 CompTIA A+. We went to the special accommodations website as they directed, but when we get there, the only options available to request special accommodations for are if you have a cognitive or learning disability. I know they have allowed for it in the past. I had some students request and receive it for their AWS certifications and received it. I would think it would be the same scenario as well. It says so on the website for Pearson Vue.

Is it possible that someone who knows the rules can assist? How do we request accommodations for her? I fear without the accommodation, she will not pass. She is now a citizen of Canada, but she is from Pakistan. She received her Canadian citizenship two years ago. Can someone help me figure this out? The accommodations office is now closed. I have another possible student who has the same language barrier issues as well.

By the way, they said it could take 10 days. When my students did it, they got almost immediate approval once they proved English was not their first language. Is it really going to take them 10 days to figure out these women don't speak English well?

Thanks,

D Ross

 

[Stephen Schneiter]

Hi @dlross, I am going to reach out to some folks to make sure you can get some answers. However, I need to make sure I understand what you are wanting content or for the exam itself. It is for the exam, that can only be done through Pearson Vue when registering for the exams. I believe there is a proof statement requirement. I will talk with our certification team to verify.

 

[dlross]

Ok, thanks, @Stephen Schneiter. More specifically:

• I teach a Canadian cohort A+. There is a Pakistani woman who became a Canadian citizen two years ago who is newer to English
• Other vendors, such as AWS, allow for a 30-minute extension of time for people who are taking the certification in English when their first language isn't English.
• We went to the site, and all we see is a request for an extension of time if you have a learning or cognitive deficiency
• We would like to know if CompTIA allows for the extension of time for those who struggle with English

The problem is, learners are supposed to take Core 1 all of last week. She was trying to pull her studies together quietly without alerting the boot camp that she was struggling. I found out when I pressed her for details of her exam date what was going on. We were on the phone for three hours last night, and we were not able to get anyone to answer this question. She needs to take this exam asap, and we finish Core 2 on September 29th, and she will need to sit for Core 2 on September 30th. Time is of the essence, because the boot camp is a train and deploy situation.

Can you help assist with resolving this? She has her passport, and even when she was talking with the CompTIA and Pearson Vue customer support, her English is broken enough to where she had to repeat things multiple times. We can prove she struggles with English. But she understands it well, and she has demonstrated in class she knows the materials. She just needs the extra time. Thanks!

D Ross

 

[jarrelrivera]

CompTIA A+ exam is available in various languages.
When scheduling the exam through Pearson VUE, you can select your preferred language, i.e. Arabic

 

[dlross]

CompTIA A+ exam is available in various languages.
When scheduling the exam through Pearson VUE, you can select your preferred language, i.e. Arabic

We are aware of that. However, there are times when people learn it in English and have learned the terminology in English, so they'd prefer to take the exam in English as well. Thanks.

 

[Stephen Schneiter]

I heard back from the certification department and here is their reply. "We do not extend the time for ESL if the person lives in an English-speaking country. If they live in a country where English is not their first language, an extra 30 minutes is automatically added to the exam. Unfortunately, it doesn't matter if the person recently moved to an English-speaking country."

I think you should be able to work through Pearson Vue for an extension, given that she is in Canada, which is multilingual.

 

[dlross]

I heard back from the certification department and here is their reply. "We do not extend the time for ESL if the person lives in an English-speaking country. If they live in a country where English is not their first language, an extra 30 minutes is automatically added to the exam. Unfortunately, it doesn't matter if the person recently moved to an English-speaking country."

I think you should be able to work through Pearson Vue for an extension, given that she is in Canada, which is multilingual.

Thanks for the information. I talked to her, and we just spent a day running through practice tests and built up a vocabulary list of words she didn't know. She went in to a testing center and passed! She had just under three minutes to spare, but she did pass. Thanks for checking in with me.