Hi,

Although you don't actually say so, I presume you're Chinese?

Many countries and many schools (including increasing numbers of schools here in China) require Oral English teachers to come from countries where English is the only official language. China is not one of those, so no matter how good your English is, you simply don't qualify.

You wouldn't necessarily qualify to teach Oral English at many schools in China either, so what happens when a Chinese school rejects you as an Oral English teacher? You can't really claim it is racial discrimination then. Moreover, it is likely that there are many Korean English teachers seeking teaching jobs in Korea whose standard of English is no better or worse than yours - so the Korean government is also protecting its own people from being deprived of jobs in their own country by foreigners with no greater ability.

Korea however, like China, accepts as fact that teachers from native English speaking countries almost always speak and teach better English than do their own people. It has nothing to do with race - except as a means of casual identification of those who do or do not meet the required technical criteria.

I can imagine how frustrating and unfair this may seem to you but it is evidently a Korean government regulation, which they are fully entitled to impose.

Moreover, the requirement for native English speakers covers principally countries that have similar cultures. Therefore it is not only your technical command of English that is important but an intimate familiarity with English figures of speech, idioms, proverbs and literature that also have a major influence on how well an English teacher can teach English. Being Chinese it is unlikely that you will have this depth unless you have lived in one of the native English speaking countries for a long time.

So many people who fall on the "wrong" side of the line immediately cry "racial discrimination" In reality it is nothing of the kind. It is a desire to ensure that the employer can be better assured of a greater depth of English comprehension that usually (though I accept not always) comes from native speakers more so than non-natives.

The fact that you taught Koreans here in China has little relevance however, because those people you taught came here of their own free will or were sent by the will of their parents etc. Thus the comparison between a restrictive regulation imposed by the Korean government on one hand and the free choice of individual Koreans on the other hand, really does not exist.

If you want a small example of the lack of familiarity with English figures of speech - just spare a few minutes to read two postings in this very forum in the past two days. One is from Ms Helen and the other is a response I made to her. They are both easy to find in here and you won't have to look far. Read them and you will see an example of what I mean. The teacher Ms Helen refers to in her posting could easily be someone like yourself but such elementary mistakes could never be made by a native English speaker.

Dave