Chinese-language classes full, but teachers scarce in US
The shortage has school officials traveling to China for recruits and offering guest-worker visas.
By Ben Arnoldy | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitorfrom the March 27, 2007 edition
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OAKLAND, CALIF. - It takes brute memorization, meticulous pronunciation, and compared with Spanish, a good deal more time spent in bug-eyed incomprehension. Nevertheless, American students are clamoring to learn Chinese. The problem: There aren't enough teachers to meet the demand.
Enrollment has soared, going from 5,000 primary and secondary school students in 2000 to estimates as high as 50,000 today, according to the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. When the College Board surveyed schools in 2004 about their interest in a Chinese advanced-placement test, 2,400 schools expressed interest – but many also said they couldn't find a teacher to start a program.
Three years later, the topic still tops concerns. At the first national conference of Chinese teachers, held in San Francisco earlier this month, school administrators spoke of beating a path to China and its roughly 1 billion speakers of Mandarin in search of teachers. Superintendents are also keeping an eye on the growing number of college graduates from Asian-language programs, as well as tapping Saturday schools that teach Chinese-American children their ancestral tongue.
Just as the United States has built up a huge trade deficit with China, the teacher shortage reveals America's language deficit. In China, some 200 million students are studying English through programs put in place decades ago. In the US, the sudden attention on Mandarin has exposed a serious lack of infrastructure.
"In our education system, world language has always been marginalized, and Chinese is even more on the outside," says Shuhan Wang, head of Chinese language initiatives at the Asia Society in New York. "That the world is speaking English is really a double-edged sword for the American people. It makes it easier for us [Americans].... The problem is that people understand us, but we don't comprehend them at all."
Teachers get room, board, $3,500 a year
To seed Chinese programs here, school districts are using guest-worker visas to bring over teachers from China and Taiwan. Another 34 schools this January received teachers from China through a new program set up by the College Board and Hanban, a Chinese government organization. Participating schools pay about $3,500 and agree to provide housing and local transportation to the teacher for two years, with the option to extend the contract for one more year. By 2009, the program hopes to bring as many as 250 teachers to the US.
Native teachers have strong language skills, but their temporary stays limit the depth of programs here. More important, cultural differences come into sharp focus when East meets West.
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