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California Bilingual Superior Court Employees
Local trial courts throughout California employ many bilingual staff members. In 2015 the Judicial Council adopted the Strategic Plan for Language Access in the California Courts, which includes:
Courts must ensure that bilingual staff providing information to Limited English Proficiency court users are proficient in the languages in which they communicate. All individuals designated as bilingual staff by courts must meet minimum standards. Courts should not rely on self-evaluation by bilingual staff in determining their language proficiency. Each court may wish to select a standard (or multiple standards) based on the position being filled.
One resource available for testing bilingual staff members’ speaking proficiency in Spanish and 69 other languages is the Oral Proficiency Exam (OPE) currently available through Prometric. Although the Judicial Council uses this exam offering for court interpreters, anyone (including court staff) can take the exam with the standard fees.
The Oral Proficiency Exam measures the ability of an individual to communicate in the language being tested. Candidates go to a testing center to take the exam. The exam is conducted over a secure telephone line by a live, trained, and certified American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) interviewer. The exam will be recorded by the ACTFL interviewer so that it can later be rated. Register and schedule your exam at one time by calling Prometric at 1-800-967-1139, Option 2, Option 2, Option 3 between 5 a.m. and 3 p.m. (Pacific time), Monday through Friday.
State Court Bilingual Employees
Bilingual staffs who work at the state courts can take the Oral Proficiency Exam to assess their proficiency in Spanish plus 69 other languages.
A list of available Oral Proficiency Exam (OPE) languages is shown below
NOTE: Candidates pursuing registered status in one of the languages for which OPE is not available still must take and pass the Written and the English OPE. Please note: Exams are subject to availability.
| Afrikaans | Akan-Twi | Albanian | Amharic | *Arabic | *Armenian | Azerbaijani |
| Baluchi | Bengali | Bosnian | Bulgarian | Burmese | Cambodian (*Khmer) | *Cantonese |
| Cebuano | Czech | Dari | Dutch | English | French | Georgian |
| German | Greek (Modern) | Gujarati | Haitian Creole | Hausa | Hebrew | Hindi |
| Hmong/Mong | Hungarian | Igbo | Ilocano | Indonesian | Italian | *Japanese |
| Kashmiri | *Korean | Kurdish | Lao | Malay | Malayalam | *Mandarin |
| Nepali | Pashto | Persian Farsi | Polish | *Portuguese | *Punjabi | Romanian |
| *Russian | Serbian-Croatian | Sinhalese | Slovak | Somali | *Spanish | Swahili |
| *Tagalog | Tajik | Tamil | Tausug | Telugu | Thai | Tigrinya |
| Turkish | Turkmen | Urdu | Uzbek | *Vietnamese | Wolof | Wu and Yoruba |
*This language is a certified language for certified court interpreters in California. If bilingual staff would like to be a court interpreter in this language, they will be required to take the BIE. For more information, see Certified Court Interpreters.
Registration for the Oral Proficiency Examination
To register and schedule your Oral Proficiency Examination, contact Prometric at 1-800-967-1139, Option 2, Option 2, Option 3, Monday–Friday, 5 a.m.–3 p.m. (PST).
- Provide your legal name exactly as it appears on your government-issued ID during registration.
ID Requirements
Your identification must:
- Be valid and unexpired
- Be government-issued (e.g., driver’s license, passport, state ID, or military ID)
- Include a current photo and your signature
Test Locations
The Oral Proficiency Exam is offered at select Prometric test centers in California.
- Before calling, select at least two preferred testing locations.
- Note: Not all Prometric centers offer both the Written and Oral exams at the same site.