Job Discussion Forums

[wailing_imam]

Before we begin, when I say native speakers, I mean teachers from historical native speaking countries such as the UK, US, NZ, AUS and CAN rather than the growing number of native speakers from post-colonial societies such as Singapore, India, Jamaica etc.

In the world of ESOL teaching these historical native speakers are still the most sought after for teaching positions. The situation is slightly changing, but those teachers from ESL or non-English speaking countries often still find it hard to secure decent positions.

With the global economic shift away from the west to the east, and a growing sense of regional pride, and the number of competent English speaking teachers from ESL or non-English speaking countries doing their job as effectively as their historical native speaking teacher colleagues, do you think that there will still be the same demand for historical native speaker teachers by 2060?

[fladude]

Native teachers will ALWAYS be more in demand. Just look at the teaching positions in US colleges. For sure, some people teach foreign languages who are from the US, but a great number are still ex patriots from a source country. Many French teachers are actually French, for example. While of course some other people secure these jobs, natives will still have an edge when it comes to applying for jobs, if for no other reason than authenticity.

China's racism will backfire on it in the end and countries which have more open immigration policies will eventually win out. The best and the brightest... aren't ever always going to be from one race or one country.

[deepteeth]

[steki47]

Business owners will always look for ways to lower expenses. College-educated Westerners can be expensive. Plus they are always complaining about health insurance and labor laws.

The politically correct crowd will champion the hiring of teachers from ESL or "non-traditional" countries as smashing oppressive racist stereotypes.

And maybe some of them will be great teachers.

[jpvanderwerf2001]

Actually, not to be tangential here, I'm not so sure teachers in general will be in high demand by 2060. I'm quite sure that technology will be handling most language teaching within the next two or three decades. Traditional classrooms will become more and more rare, as online ("skype" type) lessons, interactive computer programs, and so forth take over.

[steki47]

Or just get robots to teach English like Korea's doing.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101228/wl_asia_afp/skoreaphilippinesroboteducationtechnologyoffbeat

This line in particular warms my heart: