Document Type

Article

Department

Professional Development Centre, Karachi

Abstract

This paper answers a pertinent question: Who are the teachers of English in Pakistan? By answering this question, the current profile of teachers of English is highlighted. We were inclined to do this study because there was no data available in Pakistan. Data for this paper was generated through a survey questionnaire, which was filled out by 100 teachers of English over three years. Out of these 100 teachers, 53 teachers were from public sector schools, 29 teachers from communitybased English‐medium schools, and 18 teachers from private Englishmedium schools. These teachers belonged to various regions of Pakistan, which included Sindh, Baluchistan, Gilgit‐Baltistan and Chitral. The analysis of the data shows gaps in the form of issues and challenges of teachers’ careers as teachers of English. The results showed that majority of the teachers teaching in the three categories of schools came from the same stream themselves. In terms of academic qualifications, in majority of the cases, the teachers had Master’s degree in disciplines other than English. The lowest percentage was reserved for Master’s degree in the field of English. Therefore, in most of the cases, teachers did not hold relevant academic qualifications to be regarded as competent English language teachers. Secondly, both in public and community‐based English‐medium schools, a significant majority of the teachers were given the English subject to teach by the administration. However, our findings illustrate a striking difference in case of private English‐medium schools in this respect where most of the teachers were self‐motivated to teach English. Based on the findings of the data, recommendations are made for policy makers which are: pre‐service and in‐service training is needed, and the hiring practices of teachers need to be rectified. Overall, it appears that there is little variation in terms of the issues and challenges across the three categories.

Publication (Name of Journal)

NUML Journal of Critical Inquiry

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