Cyril Weir, 1950-2018

A leading authority on language testing has died.

Cyril Weir was born in Merseyside in 1950, studied politics at the University of Reading (1971) and began lecturing in European studies at Middlesex Polytechnic (now Middlesex University) while studying for a master’s in political philosophy at Reading (1972-74). At this point, however, he opted to move to Iran to lecture in English as a foreign language, remaining there from 1975 until the 1979 revolution. Although such work was originally designed to fund historical research, he instead pursued a course in applied linguistics at the University of Edinburgh, where he developed an interest in language testing that defined the rest of his career. 

While working as a research officer at the Associated Examining Board, Professor Weir carried out a comprehensive analysis of the needs of international students studying at UK universities, for a PhD at the Institute of Education (1983). After brief spells at the University of Exeter and Lancaster University, he moved in 1986 to the Centre for Applied Language Studies at Reading. He directed the test development unit and had a major international impact through developing a proficiency test in Egypt and carrying out evaluation studies in Nepal, Guinea and Ecuador. He also produced a number of major books including Communicative Language Testing (1988), Understanding and Developing Language Tests (1993) and Reading in a Second Language (with Sandy Urquhart, 1998).

Moving to the University of Surrey, Roehampton (now the University of Roehampton) as professor of English language teaching in 2000, Professor Weir developed a new socio-cognitive framework for test development and validation, first set out in his book Language Testing and Validation: An Evidence-Based Approach (2005). The framework proved practical and highly influential, impacting on the work of testing organisations everywhere from Cambridge to Shanghai.

Professor Weir’s final post took him in 2005 to the University of Bedfordshire as Powdrill chair in second language acquisition, where he established the Centre for Research in English Language Learning and Assessment. Tony Green, the current director of Crella, remembered him as “a big man, pragmatic in outlook, with strong convictions but a lively sense of fun. He was a generous and steadfast friend to those he knew well…He was at his happiest surrounded by friends or family, preferably in a historic pub, and holding forth on a favourite topic, which could range from rugby to the classics, reflected in his eclectic and very extensive collection of second-hand books.”

Professor Weir died of lung cancer on 28 September and is survived by his wife Shigeko and two children.

matthew.reisz@timeshighereducation.com