Achieving sustainability is a major objective of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030. This study investigates one Ministry of Education initiative to achieve sustainability through the establishment of its Optimum Utilisation of Teaching Staff Programme (OUTSP). The study focuses in particular on the OUTSP’s two-term English Language Programme (ELP). First, it details the ELP’s modules; then, it analyses the overall results for 170 of the 431 candidates who joined the programme, before going on to examine the results of a sample group of 56 of those 170 candidates in more detail. Microsoft Excel data analysis tools were used to analyse the data. The results show that the candidates generally scored high marks in both terms. The analysis of the sampled group suggests that the noticeably higher marks gained in the second term could be explained by the fact that the candidates were all experienced teachers. The study concludes that the ELP section of the OUTSP is an effective way to achieve sustainability in education through upskilling teachers. It further concludes that the ELP benefits teachers who are willing to move away from their specialist areas or who simply wish to advance their knowledge. Finally, the study recommends that future iterations of the ELP should be spread over three terms rather than two. We also recommend providing more incentives to encourage more candidates to join the ELP.
This article investigates how “native speaker” teachers define who a “native speaker” is and how they view themselves in relation to the concept. It further explores how they feel about discriminatory practices in employability and the pay gap that are systemically carried out against their “nonnative speaker” counterparts by recruiters. Data were gathered from 10 English language teachers: five males and five females from the UK, Canada, Ireland, and South Africa, who were hired by a state university in Saudi Arabia on the basis that they are “native speakers.” The findings show that although the place of birth and the official status of English in a given country were the main defining criteria for hiring a “native speaker,” the interviewees did not view the concept of the “native speaker” in the same ways as their recruiters did, who they believed used those criteria in an overly simplistic and reductive way rooted in native-speakerism. The findings also show that the participants did not enjoy the unjustified privileges given to them by their recruiters at the expense of their “non-native speaker” colleagues. Instead, in some cases, they attempted to confront their recruiters over such discriminatory practices, and in some others, they attempted to bridge the gap and ease the tension between themselves and their “nonnative speaker” counterparts, although these efforts were hindered by the system’s unfair and unjust practices.
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