TOWES - Canada's Essential Credential

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Assessments Overview

TOWES is an effective assessment that accurately measures literacy and essential skills needed for safe and productive employment: reading, document use, and numeracy.

TOWES is significantly different from other skills assessments as clients must assume the role of a worker and use information embedded in authentic documents to solve real workplace problems. Some of the documents that you might find include catalogues, order forms, labels, and schematics. TOWES measure these skills using the same measurement framework used in IALS (International Adult Literacy Survey). TOWES has been proven to be psychometrically valid and unbiased.

ll TOWES questions are created using a constructed response methodology. Constructed response

assessments require the test taker to 'generate' an answer from the information provided. This

methodology greatly reduces the opportunity for guessing, as test takers are never provided with

multiple choice or true/false options.

All TOWES questions are created using a constructed response methodology. Constructed response assessments require the test taker to 'generate' an answer from the information provided. This methodology greatly reduces the opportunity for guessing, as test takers are never provided with multiple choice or true/false options.

There are different versions of the TOWES assessment available:

	The General Series contains content suitable for a wide variety of clients at different skill levels.
	The Sector Series contains industry-specific content and targets the literacy and essential skill requirements of specific occupational groups such as healthcare, office administration, apprenticeship, aerospace etc.
	Custom assessments are created at the request of an employer or institution to meet specific needs not readily accommodated by our other assessments.