This survey was conducted to investigate how university students gain or lose confidence in English communicative domains over four years at university. Self-assessment has been a useful instrument for measuring learners' English proficiency, and the students in this study were required to self-assess their confidence levels in TOEIC Can-Do list items. The results revealed a difference between first- and third-year students' levels of confidence in the Reading domain, but the effect size was small. In the other communicative domains, there was no significant gain in confidence over the four years. Frustratingly, there was a decline in confidence from the third to the fourth year. Even when the limitations of this survey are considered, the results clearly demonstrate that there is a need to improve the curriculum in order to develop student confidence over their four years at university.