“Write an Email to Your Friend in England”

We examine the theoretical and ideological underpinnings of the written English Matura exam, used for university admission in Poland. We consider task dimensions and analyze the exam’s purpose, task design, and rubrics to reveal test developers’ inferences about test takers’ language. Moreover, we discuss how test designers’ political choices impact Polish L2 writers from various socioeconomic backgrounds. Finally, we highlight native speaker bias present in the writing tasks, which contradicts the Polish government’s and the EU’s goal to foster linguistic diversity. We argue that the goal is not always reflected in the linguistic standards required on the Matura.