First OPIC experience

English is just a language.

But apparently it is something to be evaluated and marked in the field of talent acquisition. Since I started learning English at rather early age and have been putting good amount of time practicing it, I don’t have any fear of being in an environment to use English.

But it doesn’t mean that I am not stressed about taking English test. Throughout my high school years, English test at school came quite stressful to me. And then at college, I had to take TOEIC every semester. Even though I made fair scores on every test but I had to 100% concentrate on the listening and reading for hours which made me exhausted every time.

The most recent TOEIC I took happened on December of 2020. How time has gone fast. The result was already expired and I had to take another test to add a line on my resume. And then I heard, many HRs in firms these days appreciate TOEIC Speaking or OPIC over conventional TOEIC. I had never taken any English speaking test before but I thought I’d give it a try.

Taking OPIC costs 84,000KRW. That’s huge. Still, not a bad investment, right? I applied for it. And then the very next day, I figured I could take OPIC for free once during my SSAFY course. Shame.

Anyway, the test was conducted at an English institute. I was really glad that their equipment worked alright because they looked really old and were worn out.

I chose level 6 for the test. Not because I was full of confidence, only because I thought I’d have more things to talk about with profound topics to fill out 2 minutes per question.

I could say the test went alright. It wouldn’t be so easy to talk about any topic for two minutes by myself even my in mother tongue. But still, somehow I made it. I reckon I just murmured random things a lot.

Thought I’d get IH(Intermediate High). Or maybe IM3. Many companies take IH and IM3 as good enough results so.. those could do.

And the result was..

I made the top rank!

It sounds a bit unsatisfying that they named top rank with Advanced “LOW” but still, I felt so relieved that I made it. Hopefully it will serve me well when I am to submit my resume.