Davison and Leung (this issue) describe the field of teacher-based English language assessment as having "much variability, a lack of systematic principles and procedures and a dearth of information as to the impact of teacher-based assessments on learning and teaching" (p. 389). In this article, the author briefly explores an example of teacher-based assessment of oral English that has been implemented across Hong Kong and the ways which elements of practice have contributed to or inhibited the establishment of the systematic key principles that are needed to establish any form of large-scale alternative assessment. (Contains 6 footnotes.)