An understandable jingoist/protectionist sentiment, but all teaching is an exercise in propaganda. The simple process of standing in front of other people, calling yourself a teacher and identifying other human beings as students is in itself an activity fraught with strictures of power, class and ideological manipulation. Certainly a society which still instills a hybrid form of Marxism in every college student is fully aware of that. It is simply not possible for ‘foreign’ teachers to check their values and culture at the Chinese classroom door.

Originally Chinese law specified foreign teachers could ONLY teach oral English. Chinese educational institutions on every level gradually allowed and currently require foreign teachers to expand their subject matter; my current first-level university employer signs off on a ‘Bible in Western Culture’ course, taught by a discrete, but easily identifiable, young U.S. missionary. Chinese teachers of English do an excellent job in teaching grammar, pronunciation, and reading. Their teaching of writing is as successful as can be expected in a world where no one writes and few people read; students in U.S. colleges cannot write English.

If, as Xi Jinping, suggests, Chinese Universities decided to control the content of their foreign teachers classes, they could quickly further minimize the classroom impact of foreign values on their students. Increasing the requirements on who can teach in China, perhaps may improve the quality of teaching, but well-educated teachers are no less instilled with ideology.

In any event, I believe that Gossip Girls, Vampire Diaries, Lady Gaga, Taylor Swift and other corporate Western entertainment products have had significantly more impact on the values of Chinese youth than the ragtag army of marginally educated, self-involved and unmotivated foreign teachers. The 外教 presence in China speaks more to Chinese educational and economic values than to any insidious invasion of Western thought.