THE headache Mrs. Smiths faces with regard to the education of her son, a Grade 2 student in a private school, may be familiar to many local parents: Four different foreign teachers have taught the boy's English class so far this semester without any visible improvement in teaching quality.

"Sometimes my son has a Chinese teacher for the class supposed to be taught by expats when none of them are available. There is no guarantee on the teaching quality of expats either, as none of them can provide a teacher's certificate," complained Mrs. Smiths, the Canadian woman, who gave only her last name, to the Shenzhen Special Zone Daily yesterday (Mar 27).

For most schools in the city, having a native English speaker as a teacher can serve as a draw card, but not all foreigners currently teaching here are up to the mark in the eyes of the various stakeholders: the students, the parents and the school management.

"My son is in senior high school. He always complains about his oral English teacher, a foreigner speaking too softly to be heard in class," Zheng Ming, a securities company employee said.

A high school headmistress complained that her expat teachers were hard to manage as they were contracted on a temporary basis. "They teach in several schools and also individual students. They always have no time for school activities," the headmistress, who asked to be named as Mrs. Liao, said.

Francis Poon, a veteran Canadian teacher who has been teaching in China since 2004, classified the expat teachers teaching English in the country into four groups: fresh graduates, retirees, blue-collar-workers-turned-teachers and teaching certificate holders.

"The last group is very rare, and you can only meet them in China by chance," said Poon.

The expectation of having a "qualified English teacher with a certificate" in China is too high and unrealistic, said Robert Collins, acting director of English First in Shenzhen, an English teaching institute.

"Only two of every 10 experienced teachers we called will show an interest in working in China and none of the two will come after the interview," said Collins, who added the major obstacles included low pay, poor working hours and other contract terms.

Besides an effective recruitment system, he suggested the foreign teachers working in Shenzhen be trained before being allowed to teach.

"There are local training centers to grant teachers the certificate of teaching English as a second language," he said.

Statistics showed that there were a total of 400 expat teachers in more than 100 schools and educational institutes in Shenzhen in 2005. In fact, Shenzhen is one of the few Chinese cities to have such a large number of foreign teachers.

Du Yun, a teacher working closely with four expats in Shenzhen Middle School, said her young foreign colleagues were very popular among students. "They are young, active, easily accessible to the likewise young students. Most of all, they bring live English and fashionable terms, far beyond what we Chinese teachers can do," she said.

Editor: Wing