A report presenting a sampling of proficiency-related projects consists of two parts. The first is a report on the state of the art describing programs, grants in progress, and plans to implement proficiency-based teaching. It was found that the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages and the Educational Testing Service (ETS) have provided the nucleus of a communication network supporting efforts to measure and improve language skills, and the Foreign Service Institute's testing workshops have been catalysts for this change. The second part of the report summarizes findings from an ETS survey of the 30 participants in one 1982 workshop. Results showed participants generally felt that present textbooks are too ambitious in their grammatical content and fail to recognize the progression students follow in assimilating functional linguistic concepts; these teachers would welcome proficiency-based texts with graduated language-specific goals leading to functional competence. Many recognized the need to reorient their programs toward precise goals, and identified a variety of ongoing and potential applications inside and outside academia, including screening, orientation, faculty development for international programs, bilingual teacher certification, and in internationally-oriented commercial enterprises. Early efforts at further research by participants were also found. (MSE)