Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering

Policy on Required English Proficiency

By the time of graduation, all students in chemical engineering must be able to give a technical presentation, hold a technical conversation, and read and write technical papers in English. Students may develop these skills through independent study, through their research, and through coursework.  The Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering abides by the English Language Proficiency Guidelines as established by the Graduate College to determine whether an applicant must submit official TOEFL or IELTS scores with the application.  The Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering has, however, established its own minimum scores for admission: 

The minimum TOEFL score for admission to Chemical Engineering is 590 (paper-based), 243 (computer-based), or 96 (internet-based). The minimum IELTS score for admission to Chemical Engineering is 7.0 overall.  The Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering has its own standards for testing English Language Proficiency after arrival on campus. Typically, native speakers of English with a Bachelors or graduate degree from an English-medium university in the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, or New Zealand need not provide TOEFL/IELTS scores with their application and need not take the TOEFL/IELTS exam, the English composition exam, or the Speak Test upon arrival. (Since “native speaker of English” is a self-reported categorization, the Graduate Committee reserves the right to require even these students to be tested if it considers their English proficiency to be questionable.) All other international students must be tested for English Proficiency by the Ohio Program for Intensive English (OPIE) when they arrive on campus. 

Testing shall include the English composition exam and the SPEAK Test. In addition, if they did not submit official TOEFL or IELTS scores meeting the department minimum as part of the application, they must complete the TOEFL exam upon arrival.  Students required to take the SPEAK test who do not pass it MUST retake it each quarter until they receive an unconditional passing score. After the first year of study, no department-controlled funding will be available to these students until they have passed this test. Response to the OPIE assessment in other categories of English Proficiency is at the discretion of the advisor and the student.

This page last updated on September 10, 2009 by Daniel Gulino