Korean Students in the Philippines: Their Perceptions of Native and Non-Native English-Speaking Teachers in ELT Classroom

This paper examines the native and non-native speaker teachers' dichotomy in one of the English Language Learning schools the Philippines. Aside from the discussion regarding the issues and debates about the legitimacy of the speakers of the ‘standard' English as well as the marginalization towards non-native speakers' teachers based on previous studies, this paper also looks at how the power of the user of English language is not anymore based on who is using it rather how the language is used to create meanings that are relevant for them. Based on the result of the study, the paper shows that the participants have no clear preferences between NESTs and NNESTs. The paper does identify parallel results to the previous studies conducted in outer and expanding circle countries; however, the result reveals the incongruence specifically the marginalization among the NNESTs focusing on the Korean students conducted in Korean context. It seems that in the Philippine context, this dichotomy between the two groups of teachers is not problematic. The finding of this paper suggests that probably it is high time to consider that regardless of the background, the highlight of the discussion should start focusing on the effectiveness and efficiency of the teachers.