Job Discussion Forums

[scott wilhelm]

I heard something on the radio the other day that caused me some concern. Supposedly, the Fox administration wants Mexico's public grade schools to teach the kids English at an early age, so that by the time they graduate from high school, they are bilingual. This apparently, an effort to make Mexico even more inviting to U.S., British and Canadian investment. Is Fox really pushing this ? If so, what does it mean for the jobs of English teachers working in language schools in the future ?
Is this really official PAN policy ? Is it PRI or PRD policy as well ?
Will it much effect any of us several years down the road ?
Am I being concerned with nothing ?

[moonraven]

This isn't news, Scott. Kids in the public schools have been receving classes in English for awhile--it's part of the program of basic education. Not to worry, though. Most of the public school English teachers do not even speak English. They also make a complete mess of grammar and reading comprehension--I know because my "family" includes 4 school age kids who show me their English workbooks....

I was a member of the English Counciil of the Secretary of Public Education in the State of Mexico for the 2001-2002 school year. We had to conduct all of our meetings in Spanish because one of the members spoke no English. Her story was that she had prepared to be a Spanish teacher, but as there were no "plazas" for Spanish when she finished her studies, she was told to teach English or forget about teaching. So that's what she was doing. As you can see, there will be plenty of work for ESL teachers for quite some time....

[MixtecaMike]

Vicente Fox, apart from being a liar (part of the job requierements) is a little puppet of GWB. The only thing he really wants is for George Bush Sr. to adopt him.

Don't worry about not enough English jobs in the future, Mexicans will always want to speak English, and the "teachers" here are only interested in going on strike and blocking highways, so I can assure you that even your grandchildren will be able to find work here.

Do worry about the PRD, though. They were recently discussing a plan to tax foreigners at a higher rate than locals. Miserable little socialists.

Pray for a PRI comeback and all will be better.

[scott wilhelm]

Mike and Moonraven,
Looks like I was worried about nothing. Thanks for the replies.

[richtx1]

I did some research on the future prospects for "native speakers" in Mexico, and came to the conclusion that the market will slowly die out over the next 20 years (no need to panic, folks!) for THREE reasons. First, more Mexicans are learning English early. The administration proposal had only to do with early childhood education. Mexican schools have been teaching English in primary schools since the days of Jose Vasconcellos (and if you're a Mexican teacher and don't know who that is, shame on you

SECOND: 10 percent of Mexican workers spend at least part of their working career abroad -- mostly in the United States. A good 5% of the population already speaks rudimentary English, or learns as much as they need to learn.

THIRD: The United States (and, to a lesser extent, other English Speaking nations) businesses are recognizing the "globabl market" and are already putting technical and business information in Spanish, hoping to capture the "Hispanic" market.

[ls650]

[MELEE]

[richtx1]

Thanks for correcting my spelling. I disagree with Melee who claims a child speaking a "heavily accented English" is not speaking English. It's snobbery, imho, to claim that a person who doesn't speak "perfect English" doesn't know as much as they need. Does a taxi driver need to be able to read T.S. Eliot, or does he need to know that "cheap hotel" means barato?

[Ben Round de Bloc]

[richtx1]

[Ben Round de Bloc]

[MELEE]

Wow,

You two really had a busy weekend, didn't you?

Thanks for the defense Ben, you're right, I by no means think people have to speak "perfect English" to speak English. (You should hear my husband! If he ever lost his accent I think I'd have to leave him ) I also think all variety of English are valid (I lead a team of 15 teachers who come from 8 different countries--Including Jamaica and Uganda.)

One of my husband's nieces goes to a primary school where they "teach English" she learned to sing BINGO, but when I corrected her (It's farmer, not hammer) she told me I was wrong, because her teacher swears the song goes "There was a hammer and a dog". She has not learned any conversation skills at all, only a couple of songs and she has no idea what the songs are about.

If my father(who on a good day can say nachos grandes) saw the TV commercial I reffered to earlier if wouldn't recoginze a word, despite the fact that the child "counts in English".

I think this country has gone a little bit English crazy. I think many of us here have taught university students in Mexico, where they supposed had 3 to 6 years of English instruction before entering the university. How many of these student come to us with any English ablity what so ever?? This is ESPECIALLY true south and east of Mexico City. It would be much more productive if education officials, stopped, to a step back and took a deep breath and looked at the whole picture, and tried to improve the quality of education, including cognitive skills and study skills into the curriculum rather than try to teach English to everyone, when there aren't even enough qualified teachers to teach it at the prepa level. When a public school system has tenured primary school teaching positions that can be passed from parent to child without the child even having gone to the teachers college, they've got a lot biggger things to worry about than teaching English to 6 year olds.

[moonraven]

Returning to the original question of this thread, Fox's beating the band for bilingual education (Spanish/English, that is) is nothing more and nothing less than revisting his fond memories of working for CocaCola, and like everything else the guy says, has zero correlation with the world we are living in--at least many of us.

The latest boondoggle of revisionism is the new secondary program of studies proposed by the SEP--which puts the starting point of Mexican history at the Spanish Conquest--as if there was nothing here before Cort�s and his thugs arrived to rape, murder and pillage, and--de paso--start the clock ticking on Mexico. Intellectuals--especially historians--are outraged at this latest treavesty of education. I am only mildly surprised that they didn't peg the beginnings of the history of Mexico as being post Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo....

[richtx1]