Updated on June 11, 2024.
We are pleased to offer Portuguese language courses in-person only for the 2024-25 academic year.
If this is the first time that you are enrolling in a Portuguese course at the University of Toronto: Welcome! Any student who begins Portuguese studies in Fall 2024 onwards and has had any previous contact with the language has to complete a mandatory placement test. If you fail to do so, you risk being removed from the course. Students who have had exposure to spoken Portuguese in an informal context (living in a Portuguese-speaking country or with a Portuguese-speaking family) but little to no exposure to written Portuguese must also take the placement test. Students on the waitlist should also complete the assessment to ensure they are on the waitlist for the correct course.
Self-placement is not permitted in our program. Please be aware that if your instructor considers that you would be better placed in another course - even after completing the placement test -, you will be moved into a more suitable level. Students who consider that they have been placed in the wrong course are welcome to reach out for a conversation with their course instructor and our Associate Chair of PortugueseStudies. If you are found to be enrolled in a different, lower-level course from the one assigned by our unit without this previous conversation, you will be immediately removed from it.
In the first week of class, students will be requested to fill out a questionnaire confirming information about their previous contact with the Portuguese language.
The goal of the questionnaire and placement test is to assess your knowledge accurately and maintain a productive learning environment for those who want to improve their skills. If you claim to know less than you actually do, you are committing an academic integrity offense. See the Code of Behaviour on Academic Matters:
“The University and its members have a responsibility to ensure that a climate that might encourage, or conditions that might enable, cheating, misrepresentation or unfairness not be tolerated. To this end all must acknowledge that seeking credit or other advantages by fraud or misrepresentation, or seeking to disadvantage others by disruptive behaviour is unacceptable, as is any dishonesty or unfairness in dealing with the work or record of a student.”
Students who have previously completed the language placement test and those who have completed the prerequisite language course in the Department of Spanish & Portuguese at St. George do not need to retake this test.
If you have not studied Portuguese previously, you do not need to take the placement test and you can enroll in PRT101H1 directly.
If you have not studied Portuguese previously, but are a native or proficient speaker of Spanish (completed successfully SPA302H1, for example), we welcome you to enroll in PRT120H1 - Portuguese for Spanish Speakers.
Instructions for the Portuguese Placement Test
Updated on June 11, 2024.
Please note: To take this test, you must be a registered University of Toronto student with a valid UTORID. If you are an incoming student to the university, follow the instructions on how to change your JOINid to a UTORid and obtain an institutional email address here: Get Your UTORid & TCard
- Navigate to the Portuguese Language Placement Test on Quercus.
- Click on "Enroll in Course"
- Select "Go to Course"
- Click on "Student Background Information"
- Complete and submit the quiz.
- Send an email to the Associate Chair of Portuguese Studies to prt.program@utoronto.ca with the result of your placement test. Use as a Subject line: <Your Last Name, Your First Name> PRT Placement. It should read like this, for instance: Smith, Benjamin PRT Placement / de Almeida, Hannah PRT Placement
- Schedule a a brief language assessment and oral interview with the instructions given to you by the Associate Chair of Portuguese Studies.