any CT i met, did not speak English correctly or really understand well, they say too many ''aa'' , fail at pronunciations, and I---have---too---talk---slooowllyyy- to them, so they can understand. they would not be teaching western pronunciations, but Chinese

I think you spelled "E-S-L" wrong....

However, to answer your question, there are indeed quite a few people for whom English is not their native language yet they would be excellent teachers. Grammar, pronunciation,etc.   Never met a person from Sweden whose spoken English I did not envy.

I think it should be on a case by case basis rather than blanket "they cannot teach" approach.  After all, just because you can speak the language does not mean you can teach it, even if it is your first or only language.

your post says it all, no offense  but  you dont need "the non native ..."

why do the china schools not prefer the non native ELS teachers?

I have this very problem. I have been rejected by sooo many schools because I'm chinese. Or there's been times where they request a photo and then I get no reply.

The most common excuse is, sorry our school want the right imagine for foreign teacher. Well I think the people in the education department need a bit of educating themselves!

Pretty much what Ted said... most students are going to learn English from Chinese teachers at some stage. They can help them with grammar, vocabulary, sentence structure, etc (but not always accurately).

However, styles, registers, and just straight pronunciation is something only a native-level speakers fully understands. Even if their grammar isn't great, and they have a limited vocabulary, it's knowing what works and what doesn't that makes a LOT of difference!

I think it's an interplay of factors at work. The simplest to grasp is the supply of the needed service. There are a lot of native English speakers flocking to China. Schools therefore know they stand a chance to get a native speaker to teach. If there were no natives willing to teach in China, schools here would have to do with non native speakers.  I have a personal reflection on English teaching in China,though.

Other factors constant, given a chance to chose between a native and non native speaker, a student will, understandably, chose the native speaker because that assures the learner he will get the language in its 'pure' form. However, as some contributors have rightly observed, being a native speaker of a language is in itself not a guarantee that the person will be an excellent teacher. That's why even native speakers have to go through university training to master the art of teaching their own language. And during language education training there are basically two areas of focus: training a person to teach fellow native speakers AND training him to teach the language to speakers of other languages. Language teaching approaches and methods in either case are/are supposed to be different. With this in mind I would say Chinese schools that hire native English speakers who have gone through Language Teaching Training ( especially the teaching of English as a Second Language) are doing a commendable thing. However, I consider what is happening in other schools somehow dangerous for learners & I think  parents are simply being smartly ripped off.

By hiring just any native speaker who knocks on the door, regardless of their language teaching' skills/abilities some schools just show all they care about is the money parents pay as fees for their kids. Much as such schools are in business, therefore interested in profits, I think this is not fair as I believe business profits should also go with fair practices.

Some have argued to say some schools hire even untrained native English speakers because parents want 'to see a caucasian' teaching their kids. Well, in Marketing thinking, this makes sense because such schools are only trying to meet their clients' need - the client says I want a caucasian. All u have to do is to produce one if u want the client to issue a cheque. That's simple marketing thinking.

However, I believe Schools could also employ a different marketing & PR approach. They need to send a message to their clients that they ( schools) are specialists, real specialists in  education. As such parents should trust school managers' judgment regarding  the recruitment of teachers. If they can make that kind of message clear and in  a manner that shows they believe in offering the best education schools won't stress themselves over whether they are recruiting a native or non native English speaker. What will matter to them is to recruit the best among the candidates that apply for any teaching position. The 'best' in this case would be the one who has language teaching skills, whether he is native or not.

Of course in the event of a native and a non native speaker standing at par in terms of academic qualifications, training, professional skills & work experience then I would recommend hiring the native speaker for the simple reason that it will be good for learners to get the language from a person who has the skills and can teach the language is its pure form. This does not i any way suggest non native speakers are 'bad' teachers of English, though.

So, if schools can get hold of native English speakers who are qualified to teach the language, good for them, otherwise so many non native speakers can equally do the job. But probably non native speakers also need to accept the fact that competition in getting a job is never easy, it's always tough! And where well trained native speakers are available such a competition will not only be tough but tougher and frustrating. The sooner they embrace this the less the frustration non native speakers will suffer. REALITY!

I think you mean to ask "Why don't Chinese schools prefer non native ESL teachers?" In any case, we'd typically try to cut out the double negative and ask "why do Chinese schools prefer native speakers?", (and this question has been asked and extensively answered, incidentally)

Also, why are you making the general statement "non-native speakers have good ... ability in teaching"? That's just as dumb as the Chinese assumption that every old white idiot can teach. I've worked with great non-natives and also really shit non-natives.

San, look at your grammar and sentence structure and then get back to us on that same question

It's the same in other countries as well from what I've seen. Say in America if you wan't to learn Chinese or Spanish the students/parents prefer the teacher to be a Native speaker.

Just like you don't see schools in America flocking to give jobs to white people teaching Chinese, you aren't going to see a huge demand in China for Chinese people to teach English.

It's too bad because I've met some very very very qualified Chinese people (or people from other non English countries) who are great at teaching and their English is perfect. But they get paid really bad compared to foreigners and that's simply the reality of the situation.