Symphony in White, or welcome to my midlife crisis

"Did you make it to the NGA?" one of my oldest friends asked as I slid into the car near her office in northern Virginia. I'd planned to have lunch with my dad in Maryland and then metro to the National Gallery of Art to stare at James Whistler's Symphony in White for an awkwardly long time, just like I used to do in college. I hadn't even planned on seeing other paintings. 

The timing hadn't worked out, though, and like so many missed connections, I lost my chance to see one of my favorite paintings for at least a year. 

I wasn't even sure why I'd forsaken a free crash pad in New York City for the trees, school buses and starter homes of northern Virginia, but something under my outer skin of dissatisfaction and inner baseline happiness said that this was where I should be for a few days. It was the site of my last depressive episode late in college, which I'd mistaken for senioritis at the time. I was staying with a friend from that time, and we had plans to Facetime with another. The fourth member of our little group made up my cohort of bridesmaids in 2010 but wasn't available. 

Four women who graduated together and remained friends for decades, who'd all taken different trajectories in life. One became a lawyer, married and bought the Falls Church starter home where I was staying. She'd quit her respectable job in an instant if she felt she could. Another became a stay-at-home mom in the Baltimore suburbs. The third got a Master's in early childhood education, married, had two kids, moved to the West Coast, and is now battling mental illness. 

And the fourth? She spent a some time in Asia and tried to build a life in DC, but ended up quitting her boring office job with the greige cubicles to move to Taiwan and explore a newfound passion for adult education. She wasn't very good at it at first, but got better over the years. She owns no home and has no children, but lives in a beautiful downtown apartment, speaks Mandarin and spends her double-income-no-kids cash on globetrotting.

Add to that a recent family reunion which involved spending a weekend with a group of people who are mostly related to me but have chosen myriad different life paths. Things I could have done but didn't: doctor, park ranger, entrepreneur, marketing specialist, architect, product director, data scientist, schoolteacher, housewife. 

My friends' stories are their own, but all of us seem to have been wondering recently if we'd make different choices if we could go back. Personally, I know I made the right decision to stay childfree, but wonder if all those years of insisting that I'd intentionally not boarded the bus to a better-respected and remunerated corporate job and single family home was a big fat lie: had I missed that bus, and was presenting it as a choice a mere salve for the ego? 

It's unclear, but I can say definitively that something is amiss. It's not that I'm unhappy, and certainly I don't want to blow up my life like so many people in their forties who know something is wrong. 

I spent these days listening to my college friends' victories and tribulations, wondering if I wasn't a bit jealous -- but of what? If my marriage remains happy and loving, I don't regret not having children, and I like where I live, what exactly is causing this melancholy?

Work is an easy but incomplete answer. I haven't felt long-term challenge or mental stimulation in my career for a few years. The golden period when I was mostly doing teacher training has passed, and with it a series of novel challenges that forced me to be creative and use all my fancy certifications and degrees. The improved pay is gone with it; I still do some, but most of my work now is back to the regular classroom, plus occasional teaching material design. 

Even though I find it a bit easy as I've done it for so long, that would be fine if I felt I was bringing in a satisfactory salary and professional recognition. As I watch others in my social circle get promotions and earn progressively more money, I'll admit I do feel a bit trapped. I guess I thought my work would evolve into something more, with more challenge and money attached. It never did, at least not enough.

This isn't something I could have imagined saying even two years ago, when I was mostly doing teacher training and would have said without hesitation that teaching was a passion. Someone I saw as a mentor at the time assured me that the job can evolve, and with that you'll have both fulfillment and more financial security. The fact that teaching simply doesn't pay all that well compared to most other white-collar (and quite a bit of blue-collar) work was fine when it was a calling, a passion, a fulfilling occupation that gave life meaning. 

But when it started to get a little stale, a little this again?, I started asking myself why I chased a poorly-paying passion over corporate whoredom. If sustained passion for work is a lie, and I'm not going to be wholly fulfilled or challenged by my job even if I reach for that unicorn, then why did I limit myself like this?

I could have been a musician. I was good once, or so I'm told. I studied International Affairs; I could have been an analyst. It's too bad I don't respect the bad ones, and most of them are bad. I could have done anything else, but I chose teaching. Now, I'm not sure why.

The truth is, while I once would have clung to teaching no matter what, right now I'd quit without hesitation if something more challenging with better pay popped up. I don't know if this is a fleeting thought or a more permanent disillusionment.

It does go a little deeper than mere work woes: I have ADHD  and anxiety -- now fully diagnosed but only somewhat successfully treated -- so just about everything rots on the vine for me eventually. I get distracted or bored, and struggle to engage fully. I could have worked my ass off in that greige office for a promotion, or rather, I couldn't because my staticky, undiagnosed brain refused to care despite consciously knowing that I should. Perhaps my falling out with teaching as a passion and career choice is just another in a string of dots I simply cannot connect.

I want more money and more challenge, but if you asked me what actual thing I want to do, well, I haven't got a goddamn clue. I'm not sure I ever will -- how does the old quote go? I have no dream job, I do not dream of labor.

Perhaps I would have made different choices if I'd gotten diagnosed earlier rather than flitting to the next dopamine hit, the next challenge, the next country, the next set of coursework, the next language. Hell, I can't even concentrate on Mandarin and have abandoned it for Taiwanese because it's more fun, more in line with my politics and a hell of a lot harder. 

This is complicated heavily by my choice of home. I don't want to leave Taiwan. My husband and this country are the two best things about my life. As someone who's always sought a meaningful vocation, this is hard to admit. So my marriage and my home now mean more to me than my career success? In 2002, Depressed Senioritis Jenna would have never guessed. 

But what else exactly can I do if I don't leave Taiwan? There are office jobs if you speak Mandarin (and often if you don't), but I don't specifically want one. In fact, The lack of reasonable time off alone sours that idea. I can't point to any specific perks such a job would offer beyond a more stable (but not necessarily high) salary, but there sure are a lot of drawbacks. 

Even if I do leave Taiwan, I'm not sure what I'd do exactly. I have certainly limited myself as a teacher; every time a friend or family member brings up what I might do if I returned to the West, they describe a life which is a marked step down. 

That's privilege, of course. Living in Taiwan provides the privilege of a good life as a slightly-bored freelancer, and that is in no small part due to whiteness, foreignness, or both. 

One of those friends called it privilege without compunction. She pointed out that all of us are struggling in some ways and killing it in others. Those who are grinding at work might have unhappy marriages. Happily married couples face different challenges as parents. I agreed about the privilege but pointed out that I'm doing okay, but not as well as I'd hoped. I've wanted to be a homeowner for some time, but am priced out of just about every market. We have retirement savings, but not enough. In fact, it will never be enough. That's not hyperbole; I've done the math. I'm on this wheel forever.

"You live downtown in that gorgeous space and travel the world. You're doing fine," she said. 

A cousin at the family reunion expressed her admiration for how "accomplished" I am. The compliment felt good in the way getting a tattoo feels good: an endorphin rush from a million tiny needle pricks. I couldn't figure out how exactly I was accomplished, at least compared to the impressive careers of my relatives. I'm a freelancer in Taiwan with a lot of hobbies who hasn't done much with her life. 

Of course I didn't say this, and my cousin probably thinks I genuinely am accomplished, rather than just being some white rando who loves Taiwan, has lost her passion for her work, and is learning two languages. Maybe she's even right in a sense, but I couldn't tell in what sense. I have no idea how to come to terms with my own convoluted deixis. 

Being privileged but kinda sad is a trope, and often a pathetic one. It makes me think of a wealthy '50s housewife hopped up on barbiturates, washing the dishes as she stares out the kitchen window. But then there's that viral meme about how great it would be to vacuum the house while high on quaaludes like our ancestors. Honestly, some days it doesn't sound all that bad. 

The friend I stayed with -- the lawyer with the starter home -- has recently lost a massive amount of weight. That too is her story to tell, but it's more complicated than a straightforward celebration. She described a very unlike-her fantasy of moving out to a McLean McMansion to start her Hot Wife Life: yoga pants, Stanley cup, the lot of it. 

The Jenna who lives in Taiwan and has a lot going on in her life joked that she'd need a horrible pyramid scheme "job" to complete the tableau. The anxious Jenna whose career seems to have stalled and who never feels quite secure regarding money sees the appeal. 

On my last night in Falls Church, three of the old college gang were sharing memories. I love a good Terrible People story, so I talked about a Halloween party so bad that I took my bottle of cheap tequila home because I didn't want someone dressed as a sexy honeybee who was destined for the Hot Wife Life to have it.

Another recalled briefly dating my then-best friend (we no longer speak; it's for the best). The third asked if we remembered the time I bought a CD single of Live's Lightning Crashes at Eastern Market, an old song even at the time, and we laid on the floor in my Rosslyn apartment listening to it on a loop.

All I could do was exclaim that I couldn't imagine having bought a Live CD, but apparently I did. It reads a bit hokey now, a tad cringe, but then we were all cringe back then. 

But you know what has buoyed my maudlin thoughts on this train to New York, where I'll catch a plane back to Taiwan and a life I'm eager to return to while also feeling a little depressed about? A cringe 90s song about confusion setting in and forces pulling from the center of the Earth again.

It's the perfect lament for four hours gliding along a single track toward a final, immutable destination, alongside so many other inconsequential humans skittering like hard-shelled bugs to the myriad consequences of our privilege and our choices. 

The online teaching cloister

I moved to Taipei to enjoy the city, not to be stuck in my apartment all day

A few weeks ago, I began my first face-to-face foundational TESOL training course since COVID hit Taiwan. We'd gone online at some point and were struggling to resume in-person learning. 

It had truly been so long that in the fog of the late pandemic I no longer remember when it happened, only that trying to teach that course online presented a host of problems. I couldn't really demonstrate various in-person interaction patterns, for instance. Nor could we discuss classroom management components such as boardwork and layout in an impactful way. A practicum (demo) is a vital component of this course, but it's harder for inexperienced teachers to lead interactive demos online. Everything takes longer online, too, and it was a challenge to cover the course requirements. 

When we finally opened a face-to-face course, on day three someone tested positive for COVID. Within a week, about half the class was infected, and I was teaching face-to-face with four students and a computer running an online meeting with the other three. I then tested positive, and it was back online for all of us.

My heart sank when I realized how it would go: back to my home office, back behind a screen. Yes, it's an incredible privilege to have a spare room for a home office at all, but it is draining to be stuck in there for days on end, without many chances to go out while Brendan left everyday for in-person work.

Gently put, it's a cloister. More critically, it's a prison.

While I've transitioned back somewhat to in-person teaching and teacher training, enough of it remains online that my latest stint at home prompted me to reflect anew on teaching and teacher training as a profession now that someone like me is just as likely to be working at a screen as in a room with their students or trainees.

To be blunt, I don't like teaching or teacher training online. At all. I've become accustomed to it, and of course I can do it. And yet, while some say online teaching brings people together -- it's possible to take classes you never dreamed possible if teachers and students can meet remotely -- I feel as though the screen divides me from the learners. It causes a rupture, a block. 

Everything takes longer, everything requires more planning. It's more difficult to develop rapport, especially when I have to put my foot down about cameras being left on if at all possible. Some never do, and there are situations where I can't (or shouldn't) force the issue. Imagine having students whose faces you've never seen, whom you'd never recognize on the street. I didn't become a teacher to interact with black squares all day, and I find it very hard to develop rapport this way.

Even with cameras on, I find it difficult to build the same connections with learners and trainees. To "make eye contact" I have to look at the camera, not the face on the screen. It's the same for the learner. I can toggle between these and create a simulacrum of actual, in-person, we-see-each-other eye contact, but it's not actually the same. The effect is ineffable, but definitely there, and entirely negative. 

One-on-one classes aren't so bad, as you only have to do this back-and-forth with one face. The effect is deeply felt in groups, however, especially if one of us is presenting.

I had an office job in the US all those years ago; lots of screen time, very little face-to-face contact. I hated it, and became a teacher because this is exactly what I don't want. It's kind of like attending meetings all day (something which can be tiring if you're working remotely), and you are the coordinator and host of every single meeting. I'm good at this in person. Online? Honestly, not so much -- because I don't want to be at a computer, period.

Pre-pandemic, my various jobs required me to jet all over Taipei and beyond for work. I explored parts of the city I'd rarely or never set foot in otherwise. 

Again, I realize this is a privilege. I understand that most people take the same route to the same office every day if they’re not working remotely, so “going in” isn’t particularly desirable. I get bored easily with routine, which is why I chose a career path through which I’d frequently find myself in different places. It got me out of the house, and I was able to see different parts of the city. My schedule changed often enough that there was always something at least a little new in this; it never got monotonous and I didn’t resent the extra time it took. I like to be on the move. 

You know what I don’t like? Being stuck at home most of the day, unable to leave my neighborhood or even my apartment, sometimes for entire days. If I have a training course in the morning, then an afternoon and evening class, the furthest I’m likely to go that day is the nearby 7-11. If I’m really lucky I might get to go to the ‘everything store’ down the street! 

I hate this. Plenty of people like working from home as it frees them from tiring commutes and allows them to be comfortable in their work setup. That’s great for them. It’s not for me. Mental health walks are uninspiring; I’m not good at walking with no destination. I’ve found myself making up reasons to go outside, which usually involve coffee or shopping, but they rarely take me anywhere new. No new cafes, little local restaurants or novel bus routes. No “hey there’s an Indian restaurant near Sanmin Road!” 

There is nothing worse for an extrovert than being at home all day, usually alone as Brendan still teaches face-to-face, and not feeling the rapport bump from work, either.

I have had more in-person opportunities recently, having started a new part-time gig that I'm enjoying quite a bit and pays very well. It's partly face-to-face, and that helps -- but they also underscore that being mostly online is a problem.

In fact, let's talk a bit about boredom and big career questions.

It’s easy to say I’m transitioning from teaching to more teacher training because it pays much better (to be clear, it does), but I’m also motivated by the level of challenge. It seems as though it should be easy to coast at the sort of work I’ve been doing forever, but I tend to get distracted and stuck if I do the same thing for too long. I know stagnation affects my performance, so it’s time to reach. This means more work overall, but that's the fundamental truth of what it means to seek challenge.

If all of this sounds vague, it’s because I don’t want to give too many specifics about work for all the obvious reasons. Besides, I genuinely like the people I work with. Most of them run their businesses well, or at least well enough that I don’t walk. I don’t want to hop on my blog to gossip about good people. 

Yet internally, I’ve been fighting…something. Distractedness? Demotivation? The delicate balance of work with my sub-optimal health? It could be any or all of these, and 

one of the leading causes is the pivot to online teaching.

Of course it's not the only reason. Working in Taiwan can be tough in certain ways: raises are rare, there’s no such thing as a paid holiday, it’s a battle just to get employers to do basic things like contribute to labor insurance and pension. In general I do not feel that teaching in Taiwan pays enough at the higher levels of ability and experience; I stay in Taiwan because I love Taiwan, but the honest truth is I could make more money in just about any other Asian country. 

Teacher training is a lot fairer in terms of compensation, and I won't lie: that's another reason why I gravitate towards it.

Every day I fight the notion that I’m good at my job simply because I’m a white native speaker. I think I am indeed good at my job, but that’s not the reason! 

None of those are the core of it, though. I’m used to the lack of benefits, and beyond wanting to be comfortable I’m not particularly motivated by money. (I'm only somewhat money-driven.) I didn't start to feel this distractedness until work mostly went online. Period, end of story, that's it: everything else is manageable but remote teaching is not what I want, and never will be. 

What's worse, because I don't actually want to be teaching online, I'm not as good at it. I'm less careful; teacher talking time shoots up; interactions don't vary as much as would be optimal; I'm less innovative. I'm less motivated online, full stop.

Online teacher training is even harder to pull off, but at least the level of challenge keeps it interesting.

Just to clarify, I’ve been forthright about this at work. Nobody reading this who knows me in real life would be surprised to hear it. It doesn’t really change the current situation, though — how could it? 

There are benefits to being online, however, that almost negate this (almost). Collaborative documents, chat boxes, interactive whiteboards: all things made possible by an online interface. It would be harder to schedule my own Taiwanese lessons if we met face-to-face, and I will probably start Armenian lessons online in the near future -- something that would have been impossible not that long ago. Trainees who can't attend my sessions in person are able to log in for the online ones; they get a benefit they wouldn't have been able to access in the Before Times.

That said, all this new technology never runs quite as smoothly as it should to be considered a true advantage. There’s always that one learner who can’t figure out how to access the materials on Google Docs (or can’t access it at all if they’re in China or have some sort of work-related block to that function). Zoom’s interactive whiteboard is clumsy and annoying. My noise-canceling computer is fantastic when my cleaner is vacuuming, but not great when we need to use audio recordings, as they don’t tend to play clearly. Getting everyone to mute themselves to listen on their own takes — you guessed it! — more time. 

Teaching online doesn’t even come with the only real benefit of remote work, which is freedom to travel and do your work elsewhere for awhile. I can’t go to a cafe — it’s a class! I suppose I could head south or east, but I can’t, say, fly to Europe or the US and work from there unless I want to keep some very weird hours. I’ve tried (ask me about 6am classes at my sister's old apartment in Hoboken someday) and it never really works out. 

It's caused me to ask some Big Career Questions. I love teacher training and don't want to give that up, but if I took on less teaching work and picked up, say, an editing or materials development job, at least I could go to a cafe for a change of scenery instead of spending the entire day in my little office cloister. I won't turn down online teacher training because I enjoy it too much, but I have considered refusing online language teaching to do this. I haven't pulled the plug on that yet, but we'll see. 

There’s no clear solution here; this is just my life now. If I had a different sort of job where I was desperate to escape the fluorescent horror and greige cubicle walls of an office, I’d probably welcome remote work. I became a teacher in part to avoid that! One of the reasons I’ve sought out more work is for those face-to-face hours; it will make the online portions of my job more bearable. At least I’ll have more chances to go somewhere! 

The 2022 Updated Teacher Training Post

A few years ago, I wrote a long post detailing every teacher training opportunity in Taiwan, from short certification courses all the way to a discussion of whether or not to do a PhD. That post is still relevant (and I've updated some links as well), but I'd like to offer a narrower focus. Cut out the noise and just look at a few key options that might be the best fit for the person who asks this:

I'm a foreign English teacher in Taiwan and I want to get some accredited training to do my job better. How can I do that without leaving Taiwan?

Depending on your needs, prior experience and teaching credentials, any one of these programs might be right for you. You may even choose to do more than one -- I stacked a CELTA (which is like a CertTESOL) on top of a Delta (like a DipTESOL) and topped it off with a Master's. Or, you can take one course and call it good -- you'll still know more and improve more quickly than just about any teacher that doesn't invest in their professional development.

The Trinity CertTESOL and TYLEC

These are fundamental certifications -- the CertTESOL is similar to the CELTA (although it is slightly harder) and focuses on the basics of teaching. You can take this and go on to teach children/young learners, however, your teaching practice will generally be with adults. Both courses require some pretty intensive input sessions -- the CertTESOL usually meets every weekday morning for a semester. You'll have to teach quite a few assessed lessons, do observations and take exams, as well. While it's possible to do this while having an afternoon job, you will be extremely busy. However, people do it. (If a 4-week intensive option is ever offered, you'll want to take time off for that -- it is not possible to take that course and work at the same time.) 

The CertTESOL can be taken by pre-service teachers, that is, people with no teaching experience, but is also helpful to teachers with experience who have no prior training. It is hard work, and you'll want to be ready for that. The CertTESOL is accredited at Level 5 in Europe and the UK. It's a 130 hour course, not including significant self-study time.

The TYLEC is a little different. The acronym stands for the "Teaching Young Learners Extension Certificate" and is a level up from the CertTESOL. It's actually significantly more difficult, accredited at a Level 6, so applicants do need significant teaching experience or an initial teaching qualification (which doesn't have to be the CertTESOL, by the way). It focuses on teaching younger learners and, as with the CertTESOL, you'll have quite a bit of input. You'll also have to keep an observation journal as you observe other young learner classes, and teach your own assessed lessons for more than one level of learner. The 60 hours of guided learning do not include a similar amount of necessary self-study.

If you want an initial high-quality qualification that will help you teach any age and level of learner, and have no prior certification and not much experience, go for the CertTESOL. If you are committed to teaching young learners and do have significant experience or a qualification (better yet, if you have both), the TYLEC is probably a better fit for you.

Both of these courses can be taken at InspiredCPD. 

The Trinity DipTESOL

Similar to a Cambridge Delta, the DipTESOL is for committed teachers who have an initial qualification and significant post-qualification teaching experience (usually the rule is two years, though it might depend on the quality of that experience). It's equivalent to a Level 7 on the European accreditation system. It requires more of a time commitment (150 hours of input sessions, plus far more self-study), but is split into multiple sections. 

As such, it's also more expensive than a CertTESOL or TYLEC, but if you're committed to teaching as a career, I would say it's worth the money (I have a Delta and found it to be the most challenging and rewarding of my various qualifications).

The CertTESOL runs about NT$55,000, the TYLEC is $70,000 and the DipTESOL runs about NT$110,000. Payment terms are flexible, however. 

Why not CELTA and Delta, you ask? Because while there are online options for both -- I did a Delta from Taiwan -- the Trinity courses are now offered face-to-face in Taiwan.

The DipTESOL can also be taken at InspiredCPD. 

The International Teaching Master's from Framingham State University (Master of Education with a concentration in International Teaching)

Brendan is currently enrolled in this program and seems quite satisfied with it. So, rather than talking about a course I didn't take, I'll let him tell you about it:

The program I’m in is entirely online due to Covid-19 (though I don’t know if that will continue to be true for future cohorts). It consists of nine courses, each of which lasts for about five weeks and are designed to be doable while also working full-time. The courses are spaced so that we get a month-long break between them. Tuition fees are currently just over $650 per course.

The material is clearly designed first and foremost with K-12 education in mind, which is different from what I do in my own work (my students tend to be university age or older). But I personally see this as a positive: my formal education in the field so far consists of a CELTA and a DELTA, which are about language teaching for adults, so it’s nice to be able to get a broader perspective on teaching. The professors are aware that the students are from a variety of teaching contexts, and there’s been nothing so far in the material that I haven’t been able to make relevant to my own situation.

Of the material I have studied so far, I would say the most relevant has been the course dealing with special education and learning disabilities. Although much of it was focused on young learners with disabilities, much of it can also be applied to adult students, and it really got me thinking about how I can more actively work to make my teaching accessible to all.

I like this program because I feel it is making me more well-rounded as a teacher and is helping fill in a lot of the gaps in my professional knowledge. I don’t know what I’ll be doing professionally ten years from now, and I feel this program is helping to prepare me for multiple options.

It's worth noting that the Framingham program is not specifically about English teaching, and there's nothing in it that focuses on TESOL in itself. However, it's useful for a wide range of teaching beyond TESOL. Framingham does offer a program focused on English teaching, but it's not available as often due to lower demand.

The link in the header to this section will take you to the program's main page. You can also get on the mailing list here. 

A teaching certificate through TCNJ or Teach-Now (through Moreland University)

Both of these programs focus on general teaching, not TESOL specifically. Both require practicums. TCNJ (Teacher's College of New Jersey) hosts lectures in Hsinchu -- or at least they did pre-COVID -- there's a solid chance they've gone online in recent years. Contact them directly to learn about their post-COVID setup, to see if there have been any changes. The program requires no dissertation but does lead to a Master's. From my last post:

TCNJ also qualifies you to take the Praxis II (teaching qualification exams in the US), available on a very limited basis in Taiwan.

The program requires you to be teaching more than English as it's not specifically a TESOL course but rather one for general young learner education, and your practicums are done at your own work location. The program doesn't require a dissertation but it does require you to take the edTPA.

 

TeachNow costs $6,000 and runs for nine months, but is flexible. There are nine modules -- a friend describes it more as a BEd program than a Master's, but praises the training as practical and reflective. "Quite sweet" he called it. They have rolling admissions so you can join anytime. There are virtual practicums in the last few months -- you have to teach 5 classes and record them. You should have a mentor in your local setting and through the program, and you cover everything from technology in the classroom to classroom management, lesson planning and learning culture. 

There is of course self-study which can take a variable amount of time. One friend in the program says it takes less than they say, another says that a single practicum cycle including recording and editing the lesson for submission takes 6-8 hours. I don't know how easy it would be to do if you don't have access to a local mentor through work, but it may be a good option. 

A friend doing TeachNow through British Council in Vietnam says that the program has definitely made him a better teacher. You can't get a better endorsement than that! However, unlike TCNJ, you'd mostly be interfacing with the program online. TeachNow leads to a K-6 teaching license.

For both TCNJ and TeachNow, you have to do the teaching license exams. TeachNow gives you a teaching license in Washington, DC but it can be transferable. If you're not American there are some extra steps to follow, but theoretically it can be rolled into a UK qualification like QTS (Qualified Teacher Status).

Other local and online options

These training opportunities are not the only ones available for foreigners looking to improve their teaching qualifications and abilities. My earlier post outlines some online options including MATESOL, PGCE (a British qualification) and programs through Nile, Bell and The Distance Delta. It also covers local options through Taiwanese universities, the Teaching Knowledge Test and a local certification program which runs 35 hours and now includes online options. Have a look there for more details.

Does Taiwan already have the English teachers it needs? Yes and no.

As a result of an online petition to allow foreign English teachers to enter Taiwan, some have said that Taiwan already has the teachers it needs -- basically, that there are plenty of locals with high enough English proficiency to teach, as well as immigrants from Southeast Asia who are often not ignored as potential teachers, stuck in lower-wage jobs despite potentially having strong English proficiency.

But…what if, just what if all the English teachers you might want are already here, who just happen not to be white foreigners? https://t.co/qZG2QJOKDG

— 酷兒福爾摩沙人queerformosan (@queerformosan) September 4, 2021

And a comment in response to this article (quick pull quote because eventually Focus Taiwan will archive it): 

The cram schools and the Foreign Teachers Coalition are appealing for inclusion in the categories of foreign nationals who recently received special permission to enter Taiwan, following those of international students, professors, and scholars, coalition member Oliver Ward told CNA Thursday.

I didn't black out the name because it's a public comment and doesn't say anything scandalous or wrong.

It's worth noting that other versions of this story say that most of the teachers who are waiting to enter are qualified teachers, and many have contracts to work in Taiwanese schools. They don't appear to be random foreigners, or at least not all of them are.

There's truth to the negative reactions, however, and ideologically I agree as well. Taiwan already has plenty of teachers who, from a language proficiency perspective, could potentially be English teachers. And yet, they're ignored in favor of hiring mostly white foreigners.

Native speakerism -- the idea, unsupported by research, that a "native speaker" teacher is preferable or better than a non-native speaker -- is a massive problem. First, it's difficult to even define "native speaker" with any sort of specificity or academic rigor. Someone who has been using English since childhood might not be proficient enough in it to teach it, and someone who learned it well after learning their first language(s) might be indistinguishable from a native speaker (including accent, though this is fairly rare, although I know two real life examples). There are so many accents and dialects as well that the mental picture that the term "native speaker" conjures up is, for most people, not in line with reality. 

Most professionals instead use the term "L1 user", but that doesn't change the core problem: when people say "native speaker" they often just mean a white person, or perhaps a white person who also happens to be from an English-speaking country. That's obviously racist, so employers obscure what they really mean. In some cases this racism affects what salary is offered, both to L1 users and non-native speaker teachers who are not white. Not all native speakerists are racists, but the latter use the same excuses of as the former to hide their racism.

If the industry could get over this and end racism and native speakerism in the profession, then yes, it would be easier to find and appropriately pay potential English teachers who are already here. Taiwan doesn't "need" to import a bunch of foreigners at higher pay than locals receive.

When it comes to the 'native speakers' who arrive in Taiwan with little or no experience and no training but still get hired, there's no reason why a suitably English-proficient person who is already in Taiwan -- local or foreign -- couldn't do the job just as well.

There is another aspect to consider, however. The ability to teach a foreign language goes beyond the ability to speak it. Teaching is itself a skill, a professional one. There's a reason why public school teachers need to go through fairly rigorous training before they can work.

The best teachers tend to have a combination of experience and training. If the experience is extremely valuable, and they learned from well-trained colleagues, in some cases these can be one and the same. I'd hesitate to say that's typical, but it is possible. 

If the base assumption is that any old English speaker (L1 user or not) can and should be hired to do these jobs, then I don't agree. From a personal perspective, I came here with experience but without training, and realized pretty quickly that this wasn't good enough. It took a few years to save up the money to get that training, and I improved based on good advice from coworkers before that, but the fact is, I would not hire the version of myself that arrived in Taiwan to teach. I certainly wouldn't hire her to do the job I do now. 

I do think there can be a role and an entry point for untrained and even inexperienced teachers that doesn't involve expensive coursework at the outset, before you've even decided you like the job enough to stay in it. There was an entry point for me, and I wouldn't want to deny that to potentially talented future teachers. However, let's assume that when we say "Taiwan needs teachers", we do mean experienced, trained, qualified teachers.

By that metric, honestly speaking, Taiwan probably does not already have the teachers it needs.

I can't offer much data, but I am a teacher trainer and most of my trainees are local. Fairly frequently, they return to our old Line groups to ask if anyone can refer a qualified candidate to their workplaces. If that's happening often -- and in my experience, it is -- then Taiwan needs more trained teachers. I also deliver CPD (continuing professional development) courses to Taiwanese public school teachers and occasionally university professors.

The employment rate of both seems to be fairly high, though I have to admit the hourly (and even annual) contracts most universities offer are substandard compared to other countries, especially in terms of pay and research opportunities compared to the qualifications required. This is a topic all on its own, though, and usually when we talk about "teachers needed", we mean in schools and buxibans.

If you are a licensed local English teacher looking for a public school job, you are probably not going to be looking for long. And yet schools are still hiring. Therefore, there likely are not enough local teachers, and the better argument to make is that the government should be encouraging more locals to get the training to become teachers (a process which would take years but pay real dividends), rather than saying Taiwan already has them. 

The training locals get to become English teachers is pretty good. It's not perfect, but training never is. However, in my CPD courses I've found them to be enthusiastic, knowledgeable, thoughtful and creative. If you're asking yourself why so many Taiwanese students graduate unable to speak English despite having highly-proficient and well-trained teachers, the answer is simple: the test is the tumor. 

The curriculum and testing requirements are preposterously out of date and extraordinarily onerous, to the point that teachers can't implement modern or cutting-edge pedagogy the way they'd like. The tests don't even really test language proficiency! It's a classic case of negative washback. It's a credit to teachers in Taiwan that they are already aware of this, although they may not have the power to change it (in fact, this is a common complaint I hear from them).

Changing this, too, might inspire more people to become teachers and improve language learning outcomes.

That leaves foreigners. There are plenty of good English speakers already in Taiwan, but not many who are experienced and trained teachers. Again, by that metric, Taiwan does not "already have" the English teachers it needs.

I doubt many foreigners already in Taiwan, whatever their background, are licensed English teachers who are just not working in schools. There may be a few, but almost certainly not enough to meet demand. Most are not going to enter local public school licensing programs, which take years. That leaves the international certification programs such as CELTA, CertTESOL and TYLEC, as well as local programs. These programs take a few months to complete, and can produce teachers with basic classroom competency, though most will need further guidance in their new jobs (that's how they were designed; it's not a curriculum flaw -- almost nobody can learn to be an amazing teacher in a few months). 

The good news is that most of these courses are now available in Taiwan, which wasn't the case when I moved here. I work with the people who got these courses started and am able to deliver sessions on them, so I like to think I play a very small part in making them possible.

One of the reasons I went into that area was because I felt that making teacher training more accessible locally would improve the overall quality of EFL teaching in Taiwan, and provide a route for people often discriminated against in the field to change perceptions about what it means to hire a good language teacher. And no, it's not fair that a local or non-Western foreigner might need to take a course to be seen as competitive against untrained Johnny Beer Money, but not having the courses available won't address that. Bringing more diversity to the profession might be a start.

The bad news is that they're very expensive, and in a time when people already in Taiwan are seeing their hours cut due to the pandemic, they might not be inclined or able to lay out that much money. For non-Western foreigners as well as Taiwanese who might be interested in these courses, the expense is likely an even greater barrier. 

The result is unfortunate: Taiwan has all the potential English teachers it needs already. But no, it doesn't quite have the end product: experienced, trained teachers.

There is an easy local solution if Taiwan needs qualified English teachers now: offer incentives and scholarships to locals and foreigners for professional training, or apprenticeship positions that lead to full-time teaching jobs, which would provide an alternative route to the classroom. Ensure that both locals who would like to teach English and foreigners who don't fit the "native speaker" so-called ideal still have job opportunities by encouraging employers to, well, not be racist and not hide behind "native speakerism" to avoid accountability for their actions. Start this change in public schools, because it's unlikely that buxiban owners will lead the way in making these changes.

And, of course, educate parents about what it really means to have a qualified language teacher for their children: a person with experience and training, who might even offer benefits over a white face -- such as a better ability to clarify grammar and lexis that they themselves had to learn -- and that a white foreigner at the head of a classroom isn't a very good guarantee of learning actually taking place.

Reflection Eternal

                     

I mentioned in my last post that there would be more ‘headspace’ and casual blogging on here, at least until I get my bearings. And I mean that — it’s been a couple weeks but I still feel like I’ve just stepped off a Gravitron or a Tilt-a-Whirl, and all I can do is roll with that. I’ve done a lot of sleeping, and teacher training has picked up (ask me someday about my Kaohsiung Hell Week conducting EMI/EML training for university professors just before the dissertation was due; I used my incidentals’ allowance to buy a bottle of whiskey that I drained over several evenings of editing after full days of training. At least the hotel was pretty nice). I still haven’t gotten back into my normal rhythms; the research tabs I closed when I hit ‘submit’ have not been supplanted by the news tabs I used to open every day. Mostly, I rest. 

In the meantime, I just turned 40, and we celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary. For Lao Ren Cha, this means I’ve been blogging for the full measure of my 30s. I do expect that will stretch to my 40s, but what that will look like remains to be seen. Generally I don’t put much stock in life changing much just because one celebrates a milestone birthday, but I have to admit that for me, it seems to have been the case every time. I turned 20 in India, on a semester abroad that changed the trajectory of my life. I celebrated 30 in Costa Rica, on our honeymoon. We were just passing through; in fact we did a one-month bus trip from Panama to Guatemala, and it’s a testament to how long this blog has been running that I wrote about it! I celebrated 40 right here in Taiwan, 10 years married, dissertation just submitted, living a good life with far more stability than I’d ever imagined possible. The road ahead once again looks different on the other side of that Big 0 birthday.

That brings me to the real point: what’s been going on in my headspace. A few years ago I toyed with the idea of taking my writing in a more serious direction. I even wrote about it, though I can’t find that post now. It seemed like a good idea at the time, though being in grad school, I didn’t have much time to actually pursue that, though I did take steps to raise the overall level of discourse here, though I made a few exceptions when I was especially infuriated. 

Now, I honestly must say I’m happy I never went in that direction. That work matters, but there are plenty of people already doing that, many of them are quite good. There’s not much more I can add as yet another voice. Even when it comes to blogging, I do it because I enjoy it, but I don’t pretend it has a major impact beyond the relatively small bubble of people who already care about Taiwan. That’s not to say I think I’ve had no impact; perhaps there's been a small amount.

That said, over the past few years, I’ve watched Taiwan smash more soft power wins in everything from health care to music. Attention to Taiwan’s situation has even been raised in birdwatching communities. These successes in telling Taiwan’s story to the world came from people working in their respective fields who also happen to care about Taiwan. 

And what do I do as a profession, not a hobby? Teacher training. Over the past few years, I’ve come to realize that I’ve had more impact helping my students to tell their own stories - and the story of Taiwan - and in raising the skill level of Taiwanese teachers of English so that they can do the same, if they wish than I could ever have through writing alone. In short, in most places where I feel I’ve made a positive contribution, it’s been behind the scenes, helping to elevate Taiwanese voices. While I have no issue using my own to speak out as well, I’ve come to realize that it’s not where my most meaningful work lies. 

Nothing clarified this more than writing my dissertation. I interviewed six teacher trainers, a mix of Taiwanese or foreign, and the foreign ones mostly develop local teachers. I focused specifically on intercultural communication, looking at the extent and methods that these teacher educators reported using if/when they incorporated intercultural communicative competence (ICC) in their teacher development work. Within that, I took a critical look at what ICC means, or might mean, for Taiwan in terms of Taiwan’s political situation as well as critical cultural issues and awareness. In short, what is Taiwan’s story and how do teacher educators here contribute to helping people to tell it to the world? 

Through this, I came to appreciate the extent to which both Taiwanese and long-term resident foreign teacher educators truly care about Taiwan, and contribute in their own ways to advocating for this country. Most of them had something to say about Taiwan, what it stands for, and what it has to contribute — and how the world would be better off knowing more about it. It’s something I have also been involved in, in a professional capacity, and it’s clear that’s where I can have the biggest impact in the years ahead. 

I will still blog, of course. I’ll still cover Taiwanese politics and issues from my perspective. I enjoy it, and it will continue to be a hobby -- I'm writing something about the US WeChat ban now, though it's neither as fun nor as true to what's actually in my head as this post. Perhaps I will have a few more moments of making small differences through it. Who knows? Writing is important too, but I’ve come to realize through completing a graduate program that I can contribute more in different ways. 

That’s good though - it means that I can use this space to be more creative rather than just straight politics all the time; in fact, I’ve always thought of myself as more a creative non-fiction writer than any sort of journalist or analyst. And, of course, I hope to elevate more Taiwanese voices. I enjoyed editing the two guest posts I had the opportunity to put up, and would like to do more of that.

So, if the general tenor in this space seems different, there’s a reason for that.

This is also a call to all of you, my readers (yes, all twelve of you). Look at what you already do — your life, your career, your field — and figure out how you can contribute to Taiwan that way. What soft power impact can you have, in your respective fields?

Schools in Taiwan bear more responsibility for racism and native speakerism than "market demand"

There is no reason for these doors to be closed. 

When I first moved to Taiwan, I worked at one of the big chain cram schools. Every Friday, I had a class of rowdy upper elementary school kids. I wasn't very good at my job - frankly, I should not have even had that job - and they overwhelmed me. My co-teacher was an Indonesian woman who was simply amazing. Better than me, for sure. She probably still is, even though my teaching now would be unrecognizable to anyone who knew me then. The kids were awed by her; they listened to her. 

That school treated her well, though I will never know if we were paid equally (I can't be certain, but probably not). In the years after, I came to realize something: such respect is rare from schools in Taiwan, for both teachers of color and non-native speaker teachers.

These are two distinct groups - non-native speakers can be White, and native speakers are often not - but the way many schools in Taiwan think about both groups is rooted in White supremacy. Many will prioritize hiring, or only hire, White teachers. Others will hire only native speakers, but not native speakers of Asian heritage. Or they will define "native speaker" ridiculously narrowly - as though the term is possible to define at all.

Native speakerism is as wrong as racism in language teaching, an issue I've gone into before. The qualities of a good teacher include experience, quality training (which may not be the same as a certification, though some certifications are better than others), an appropriate level of English, the ability to plan and execute useful lessons well, preferably over the course of a complete syllabus, and who has good classroom management practices, and an open-minded, hardworking, growth-oriented mindset.

This is already well-known in Taiwan. However, when confronted with the issue, these schools will say it's "the market". "The market" demands native speakers. "The market" prefers White teachers. "The market" will take teachers who are not White, but no Asians. "The market" wants native speakers, but will take a European non-native speaker over a native-speaker teacher of Asian heritage.

The schools never examine their own role in how discriminatory the entire system is.

However, starting from that first year in Taiwan, it has become clear the market is not the main problem. Yes, one will meet racist or native speakerist parents and students; I don't deny they exist. But good teachers - wherever they come from and whatever language they learned first - tend to build strong relationships with their learners. Good teachers are usually successful in the classroom - even more so when the schools that hire them stand by them.

While some parents and students are unreasonable, for the most part, when asked to open their minds to a teacher who looks different or has a different accent to what they expected - they do.

The biggest problem, then, is likely the schools. Why do they insist that students and parents will only accept a certain type of teacher, when that's not necessarily the case?

For some, it's simply that they're businesses and don't prioritize education. As such, they're not willing to stand by quality teachers and take a leading role in changing the minds of the "clients" who do make racist or native speakerist demands.

For others, I suspect it's a manufactured preference: selling your "clientele" on the idea that White or 'native-speaker' teachers are somehow inherently superior, even though they aren't.

By the way, there's research to back this up, too.

You probably don't believe me yet, so instead of droning on about it, I'm going to turn my platform over to a group of teachers with varied stories, but who have all experienced some form of marginalization in English teaching in Taiwan. Note the key commonality: when their employers stood by them (and even sometimes when they didn't), these teachers all managed to build strong rapport with their learners, and in some cases the learners' parents. The so-called "market" was often open to instructors from a variety of backgrounds.

Let's start with T.'s story of a new colleague:

At the [school] a few years ago, they had a [private] practice of not considering Asian Americans for English teaching positions. Not that it was public. As the only female instructor, I felt it was essential to replace me with a woman, especially since three-quarters of our students were female: it's hard to prepare adult students to socialize in international settings without access to a female perspectives, experience, or role models.

I was disappointed--and incredulous--when someone told me, "no women have applied." Another employee showed me that several women had indeed applied, but that they had Asian names. I wrote an email to the entire office celebrating the fact that women had applied for the job and explaining why it was so important.
Because of the nature of the organization, and  Taiwan's constitution forbids racial discrimination, and because the director was a humane man, the administration took it seriously, interviewed Asian Americans/Canadians, and hired one.
Conventional belief had it that students would be dissatisfied with Asian-looking teachers, doubting the quality of their English. Instead, the new teacher was extremely popular with the students who valued her perspective of being of Asian descent in Canada and the U.S. The fact she looked Asian probably made it easier for our female students to imagine themselves navigating international business environments in English. So the belief that "customers" will be dissatisfied with teachers who are of Asian descent is outdated.
Even if it isn't, it's unethical and cowardly to give in to that as a business strategy--even when the problem is that parents of kids going to buxibans are unable to assess the authenticity of someone's English. Management needs to educate these "customers" and support their teachers, not cater to racism that sometimes exists primarily in their own imagination.
"Market demands." It seemed people were assuming they know what the "market demands," and were mistaken.
People will justify racist decision-making by saying they are doing it because someone else asked them to, as if they have no responsibility themselves for perpetuating racism when they enforce such "demands." It's not their own racism, it's someone else's that they are enforcing. It doesn't matter what they do or don't think if they enforce racist requests.


P. is from India, and holds a Master's in English Language and Literature. He's a native speaker just as much as I am; the only difference is the variety of English that he speaks.
Having completed by BA Honours in English Studies from a top university in India (2nd for Humanities and Social Sciences), I interned at a school through AIESEC in Taiwan in 2013. I was asked to teach some English lessons and share insight into Indian culture for a primary school in the outskirts of New Taipei City. It was a great experience and I got along really well with fellow colleagues and students overall. I was subject to occasional comments from students about how “black” my skin is and got questions asking me to clarify.
Wanting to pursue teaching in Taiwan, I started looking out for job opportunities. I was a young graduate, who was well travelled and spoke English as a first language – I thought the world was my oyster. I was reminded very quickly in all these ESL jobs forums on FB that I’m a “non-native” speaker of English, I have no knowledge of the “culture” to teach it and should go back to where I came from. These harsh attacks from both Taiwanese and White people in Taiwan.
I found myself a scholarship to do my MA in order to stay, and then looked for jobs. I was so disillusioned for 2 years. There were no opportunities. When some interviewers spoke to me on the phone, they would be so thrilled to hear about my qualification and experience. But when they saw me in person, they were surprised that I was not white. “We didn’t know you were black. Sorry we don’t hire black people.” 

The kind of racism I faced from White teachers was even more shocking. I expected them to be better allies, but they merely saw me a rat coming in to destroy the ESL market and reduce their wages. Even people I considered friends refused to let me help them cover their classes when they wanted time off – they too told me I was Indian and non-native so not good enough for the job.

I tutored math to a kid; I wanted to tutor the kid English instead, but they said I’m Indian so I should teach math, and they chose a white French woman with questionable English to teach him instead. Then I got an online teaching gig where I had to lie that I was Canadian or British. That was my entry point into teaching – I already had a student visa so they were happy to give me the job after a demo and a blatant lie about my father being a Western man. I did this for a few years.
After completing my MA, I started a PhD [but still had trouble finding a teaching job]. This gave me an entry point into universities as a lecturer. I must add that I only got this job because a White female friend left her post there and recommended me. I cried for hours wondering if it was real.

While students took some time to get used to me, we shared a really special bond every semester. They appreciated that I had a unique outlook to my teaching, brought creativity in the classroom, taught ESL through literature and had a more communicative approach in my teaching. Soon I found another part-time gig at another university. I was doing very well there too. I think I can say for sure that I was probably the only, if not the first, Indian to lecture at an English department in Taiwan. While this felt really amazing, it also came with its challenges. There was no scope for development, full time jobs at universities are non-existent, and no PhD means goodbye, eventually. They paid terrible wages for such a position.

This is why I eventually left Taiwan after 5 years. While I saw some success, the cost of it was much more than I could handle. Having moved to Vietnam, I make twice as much money, have professionally developed so much and work at an international organisation where my identity is seen as an asset rather than a liability or something to cover up.


R. is a teacher from Southeast Asia who speaks Mandarin, and whose English is indistinguishable from what some would define as a 'native speaker':
[I experienced discrimination at] one of those big high school chains. I had to take a test (which I aced) and an interview and the other two people they hired they literally just grabbed from the street because they look foreign. The job was to grade essays and we finished early. The two were allowed to leave early. I had to assist the front desk until my time was up. 

[In another job], I was told I spoke English too quickly at the interview. Then they went and called me a “bilingual” teacher and offered me 550 (with my 10+ years of experience) and said to my face that if a white person rolled in fresh out of college they would be offered 600. This was the moment I decided to stop speaking Chinese unless necessary. I made it my goal to be indistinguishable from a native speaker, a goal I reached maybe a decade ago. 

I don’t get repeat students too much because I teach mostly test prep so it’s usually one shot and done but I do get some students through word of mouth. And my business English students requested more classes when we were done with our first round.

Basically, the students I’ve had seem to like me. The problem is getting through the interview process because I’m often vetted for my ethnicity and passport.

C. has had issues with parents preferring White teachers, but once in a teaching position with school support, was able to be successful, showing that it is possible to fight the racism that exists in the market if schools would take a leading role:

I was born, grew up, and graduated university [in the USA]. I don't know how anyone could argue with me being American after that.

The first school I worked at I didn't know better, but I later found out that white teachers were often paired with a Taiwanese local teacher so that there were two adults to wrangle 30 students. Since I spoke Chinese I had to juggle my class on my own. I also discovered that the White teachers were paid an additional 20,000 NTD per month. I quit.

I worked at a language school as the administrative staff at [a well-known school for teaching foreigners Chinese]. Initially the school was hesitant to hire me because they said students wouldn't know who to go to if they had questions to ask in English. I suggested I should have a sign that read "English secretary". One more than one occasion the parents of a fellow overseas Chinese would come with the student to the office and demand to speak to the 'white lady' they'd spoken to on the phone. It sometimes would take me about 5 minutes to convince the parents that was me.

I have had parents and students quiz me about my English. One mother insisted my English wasn't adequate because she walked into the break room to see me eating a [typical local food] and a real native speaker of English would never eat that.

My current school generally doesn't print my last name on our public roster because of security reasons and because they've discovered my enrollment is higher when parents and students don't see the last name is [a common Chinese name]. My problem wasn't always hiring. My problem was staying the job, typically once the parents met their child's English teacher (me) and complained to the school about my Asian-ness.

Currently, I'm employed at [a language center at a major university] where my clients are the students themselves with minimal parental interference.

I got along great with my students. Currently I would say my students like me a lot too, I have several who have continued on with me for 4-5 years. It's a continuing education class so students can continue to enroll as long as they like.

In previous jobs my problem has been more parents, but it's also schools being too lazy to defend their teachers and just bowing to parental pressure. I mean, if a teacher (me) can help students score well on the TOEFL or win speech contests the school should go to bat for this teacher. Instead they let me go and hired a White teacher because that was the parental demand.


B. is a qualified non-native speaker who was denied opportunities as a non-native speaker, but whose nationality and first language were not an issue once hired:

I've faced this a couple times in person in my years in Taiwan. I'm from Mexico and that was enough to be denied opportunities.

My story is not particularly shocking or entertaining to retell, but living through it felt surreal. The contact person at one school (a private primary school, if memory serves me correctly) and I had exchanged a few emails, she had seen my CV, I went to the school for an interview, and she was very happy with our meeting. Everything pointed to me getting offered the job. Then she went away, left me in that office for a while and when she came back she said she could not offer me the job. I asked why and she matter-of-fact blamed it on my being Mexican. 

Alas, I couldn't get answers. It didn't matter when I pointed out my perfect [English proficiency test] score, my education at an international school, my experience teaching for many years, my teaching certifications - nothing mattered in the slightest. I was told one time at a teaching job interview, almost certainly at this one but I can't be sure, that it wasn't the hiring person's choice but the parents’.

I told her that her reason was insulting and absurd. She didn't budge. She didn't seem nervous or ashamed. Just matter-of-fact. This insensitivity was more than anything, what I found most confounding. I tried to keep my share of the dialog exchange short and calm to give her a chance to explain, to coax a better rationale, but I couldn't take the conversation anywhere. It was as if she simply couldn't muster enough empathy to stay present in our conversation.

I'd had many jobs before and since. I loved the two teaching jobs where I worked for the longest (at least six or seven years). I have experience teaching at all ages, kindergarten to high school, children and adult language centers, large class rosters and small, individual tutoring of children and adults, almost always English because that's where job offers are in constant supply, but occasionally was happy to accidentally land Spanish gigs too.

I first taught at that buxiban when I subbed for someone else. When they were ready to offer me a permanent part-time position they were unsure about my nationality. They asked me to take a test, perhaps it was the the GEPT, and when the perfect result came back they put aside all their concerns — if any customer ever asked they could proudly show them my score. So my nationality really was only ever an issue during job seeking.

Relationships with parents were rare but when they existed I always felt we had good rapport, and when we weren't in complete agreement about something it might be because they're surprised when I tell them their kid's participation in class is an asset. "my shy kid? That’s the first time I’ve heard that!" Perhaps people underestimate how different we can be in another language. I can't think of a single instance where a conflict with a student was at all related to my native-speaker status or nationality.

I tried hard to give them cross-cultural perspectives on linguistic prescriptivism, emphasizing that certain pronunciation of grammatical differences are normal for different communities, but I don't feel like they needed to listen to that from me in order to recognize that whatever linguistic differences were discernible in my own speech didn't take away at all from the quality of the education they were receiving.

S. is a Black American woman and talented teacher who has faced discrimination from "the market", but has been successful and popular with students when working in more professional settings:
I haven't worked at a school that was racist against me for the same reason I don't have friends who are white nationalists. They kinda already exclude me from their lives. [Years ago things were worse], but most schools that discriminate against black people nowadays tend to be [low quality] schools that are below my standards.

[In some cases] I lost performance points for things like "not smiling enough" and for losing students from a class where the parents were actually racist. [I know that because] they sat in the back of my classroom, chatting in Chinese so all the children could hear. They got pissed when I reminded them it was an English immersion classroom, even though I didn't comment on the fact that they were bitching about the Black teacher.

There were schools where kids came back to the school or skipped grades just to be in my classes, and where school owners put their kids specifically in my classes. There is optimism about good schools. But unfortunately it's not easy to find them - not unless you know what to look for.

And for non-white teachers - we don't have the freedom to walk into any job and play glorified babysitter while nursing a hangover like a white person can because those kinds of schools tend to be only about appearance over quality.

Fortunately, however, many of those schools closed down when parents and schools realized that schools that put effort into an effective English program were better than some place whose entire "curriculum" revolved around hitting flashcards with sticky balls and squeaky hammers.

As the quality and expectations of parents have risen, especially under the fact that parents now tend to only have one or two kids who they invest a lot of time and money into with the dropping birth rate, they are seeing through the façade of some unqualified dude who looks like he just stumbled in drunk from an all-night pool party (which more often than not was the case) to wanting to know the results and seeing more professionalism.

N. turned down a job with an online tutoring service because of their discrimination against others, a "business decision" that appears to have been made based on exactly zero market research:
I had a job interview for a curriculum director job. It was a tech company that was developing an online tutoring service. In the interview, I was told I would also have to find and hire teachers. The following conversation won't be 100% accurate, but it is a faithful representation of what happened. 

(Keep reading past the British bit. I'm including it because the racist bit appeared to be a lesser concern for them.)

“There is one problem, we can't use British teachers, only Americans.”
“Because of the accent?”
“Yes. We're launching this service in China, and they're not familiar with British accents.”
“OK, I understand that.”
“Oh, and we can't use Black people.”
“Sorry?”
“Yes. Because we're targeting second-tier cities in China, we're worried that people won't accept Black teachers.”
“Right, I can't do this job.”
“We know it's not...polite, but we have to do it.”
“It has nothing to do with being polite. This is wrong.”

I forget what I said, but I tried to explain why it's wrong. The interview ended.

The same company, but different person, contacted me last year to see if I could teach for them. I couldn't but asked about the policy. They said they had no idea what I was talking about, but more importantly, told me they hire people of all different races.


These stories all point to the need for schools to examine their own role in perpetuating racism and native speakerism in language teaching in Taiwan. The demand for White, native-speaker teachers exists, but it is not a given and is certainly not immutable. I do believe if these traits were to cease being advertised as some 'special' qualities of teachers in various schools, students would adapt.

If the focus were instead on hiring quality teachers, advertise that and stand by their staff, language education in Taiwan would improve overall. Market demand for White, native speaker teachers would reduce considerably. Schools could take a leading role in this change, and the success that good teachers who don't have the right 'look' or 'sound' have found in their roles shows that such a shift would be largely successful.

Instead of excusing away racism and native speakerism with "but it's the market", we should all call on schools to change the part they play in perpetuating these prejudices, and call on ourselves to be aware and reflective as well.