中国的语言教学产业：说英语从这里开始

中国的英语教学市场巨大，但利润空间相对微薄

我的妈妈曾是一名工程师，而现在是家庭主妇。我不喜欢她的职业，我想成为一名设计师。我就喜欢想出新的点子。)”这些话并非出自一个英国或美国儿童之 口，而是从一个生活在中国南方城市深圳的九岁女孩口中说出来的。孙逸瞬（音译）绝不是天才。她仅仅是英孚国际语言学校的一个普通学生。英孚教育集团是瑞典 人创办的语言教学机构，如今在大陆已有68所连锁学校。

逸瞬属于年轻的新一代，在她所生长的国度里，较她年长的几代人由于被文革剥夺了受教育的机会，所以几乎全都不会说英语。当然，中国青年人一代也正努力地学 英语，且一批又一批地熬过极度重视背诵单词、记忆语法的老套过时的教学体制的煎熬。24岁的张金（音译）来自贵州，12岁起学习英语，并在华南大学（不知是那所学校，暂用华南）读了四年本科。但是，她连组织一个完整的英语句子都有困难。

如今，中国人都热衷于学习英语。学英语的人在中国加起来有五分之一。正如英国经济部长Gordon Brown在去年访问中国时所看到的一样，今后的二十年内，在中国说英语的人数将会超过世界上其他地区以英语作为母语的人数。这无疑激活了一个大市场，这 个市场涉及书籍、教学资料、教育培训考试以及语言学校等方方面面。教育考试服务中心（ETS）Mari Pearlman估计，中国已经成为世界上最大的英语教育机构市场，每年流入该市场的金额达600亿美元。ETS是一个美国机构，该机构主办的托福考试是 一项著名的英语水平测试项目。

她还说，市场中大部分资金都用于购买教学资料：各类字典、外语练习和课堂教辅书。这些产品中的大部分都是国外教育机构同当地公司联合出版的。在中国，麦克 米伦公司已经同他的合作者外研社售出了1亿多册教学书。作为中国主要的英语书籍出版社，外研社占有五分之一的市场份额。朗文出版社（归属于培生教育集团， 而培生还是The Economist的所有人之一）、牛津大学出版社以及哈珀?柯林斯公司旗下都出版了广受好评的双语词典；与此同时新加坡汤姆森亚洲私人有限公司 （Thomson Learning）已经授权人民教育出版社出版销售其教学材料。

英语当从小学起

受政府将小学生学习英语的门槛由12岁调低至9岁的影响，市场对英语教科书的需求有增无减。在许多东部地区的城市里，孩子们6岁便开始学习英语。据估计， 现在英语教科书的销量占全国图书总销量的五分之一。虽然国外出版商必须授权给国内出版商方可出版其图书，但是英语教学市场上几乎有一半英语教材的版权是向 国外出版商直接购买的。

而且，人们对利用高科技手段进行教学的呼声也越来越高。北京市人民政府正着手在幼儿园试用英国普洛米修斯（Promethean）公司制造的交互白板（注 一）。每台交互白板的费用是33000元（4125美元），它能够让教师把传统教学材料同电影片断、无线电广播以及其他网络资源整合起来。英国文化委员会 （The British Council）驻北京的教育主任Nicole de Lalouvière表示，其公司网站已同中方的合作伙伴建立了关系，并提供各种关于词汇和商务英语的免费测试。目前访问该网站的学员有200万人，已成 为“世界上最大的在线大学”。

此外，各类考试项目也是层出不穷。原因在于：一方面踌躇满志一心想出国留学的学生们必须要参加各种国际性的大学入学考试，另一方面中国的老板们也需要能够 证明应聘者英语能力的证书。但是在这个市场中占先机的还是外国机构，虽然两家主要的考试机构——ETS和一个由英国文化委员会同剑桥大学地方考试委员会共 建的机构——都是非盈利性的组织。鉴于北京公立学校的英语教学师资缺口为50万人，且在2008年奥运会之前，北京市将积极推动英语水平进一步提高，因此 北京的教师培训行业也必将成为另外一个巨大的市场。

最后，Pearlman女士估计有大约50,000所私营语言学校已经由家族经营模式转变为连锁经营模式，比如英孚教育集团、华尔街英语以及新东方英语。 其中新东方英语被称作是最大的“国产”教育机构，参加培训的学员有250万。尽管这些学校开始是为成人教育而建立的，而现在市场上对教育的广大需求来自于 望子成龙的父母们。他们不惜花费家庭收入的一半让子女们接受教育，以期对子女们能有所裨益。现在深圳英孚学校的550名学员中超过7成的是孩子，而在过去 大多数学员往往是成年人。而且其学员还在继续向年轻化发展。如今最令幼儿园深恶痛绝的是那些为年仅4岁的幼儿们开设的英语学习班。

与此同时，成年人和大学生们可以随意挑选在国外各所大学里开设的从种类繁多的商务英语学习班，如伊利诺斯大学、马里兰大学、诺丁汉大学正在开设MBA课程，甚至要在中国开办整所学校以招揽数量众多的潜在学生。

但是将这些举措转变为利润并不总是一帆风顺的事。教育行业依旧规范林立。国家宣传部把持着教育部的行政权利决非偶然，而后者最近才获准将国外出版机构发行 的英语教科书纳入国家教学体系中。国外出版商们仍然无法在中国出版发行其书籍和刊物，仅限于收取版权税而已。他们的合作伙伴（如外研社等）正在借用其各种 丰富的资源如火如荼地培养师资、举办会议。尽管将书籍出售给私营的语言学校可以赚取更多的利润，但是这些学校也

难免受到清规戒律的束缚。外国的整个教育产 业链都需要中方合作者的帮助，而且所有教学资料需经过相关部门的审核和批准。正是这些困难和麻烦迫使英孚教育集团出售其所属的68所学校中64所学校的特 许经营权，其结果是：进军中国市场十年后的今天，英孚仍旧没有收回其投资成本。

中国政府并非完全认同西方的教育模式。在中国，任何地方的政府都不会驱车欢迎说英语（母语）的人；而在日本，19岁青年们的青年交流活动项目（JET项 目）由教育部长主持，该项目会邀请数千名外教到各所公立学校工作。而就在几年之前，在中国私营语言学校聘请英语外教会被处以罚款。

尽管中国对英语学习的热情显而易见，但是左右着市场的利润和开放程度的是中国共产党的态度。若任由英语教科书和教师们教学和思维方式的西化，可能迟早会对共产党的领导权产生威胁，所以共产党不愿采取放任自由的态度。

翻译：edenbahamut

原文： he language business in China： English beginning to be spoken here

The market for English-language education in China is huge. The profits are not

“MY MOTHER used to be an engineer, but now she's a housewife. I don't like her job. I want to be a designer. I like to think up new ideas.” Not the words of a young British or American child, but a nineyear- old Chinese girl in Shenzhen city, southern China. And Shun Yushun is no prodigy. She is typical of her English First school, one of 68 on the mainland started by a Swedish-owned language-teaching chain.

Yushun belongs to a new generation in a country where older folks, deprived of education during the Cultural Revolution, speak almost no English at all. Even young adults struggle, having passed through an archaic school system that still insists on the brute memorisation of words and grammar. Zhang Jin, a 24-year-old from remote Guizhou province, studied English from the age of 12 and then for four years at HuananUniversity. But she has trouble putting a sentence together.

Today the Chinese are obsessed with English. Anything up to a fifth of the population is learning the language. As Gordon Brown, the British finance minister, observed on a trip to China last year, in two decades China's English speakers will already outnumber native English speakers in the rest of the world. This is fuelling a market that comprises everything from books, teaching materials and tests to teacher training and language schools themselves. At $60 billion a year, China is already the world's largest market for English-language services, estimates Mari Pearlman at ETS, an American group that developed TOEFL, a well-known test of English-language proficiency.

The bulk of this, she says, is spent on teaching materials: dictionaries, language textbooks and classroom aids. Most of these are supplied by the education arms of foreign companies in partnership with local firms. Macmillan has sold more than 100m school textbooks in China with its partner FLTRP, which has a fifth of the market and is the leading Chinese publisher of English-language books. Longman (which belongs to Pearson, part-owner of The Economist), Oxford University Press and HarperCollins have popular bilingual dictionaries, while Thomson Learning has licensed its teaching materials to People's Education Press.

Never too young to learn

Demand for textbooks has been boosted by the government's recent lowering (from 12 to nine) of the age at which primary-school pupils start to learn English, and many eastern cities have begun teaching it at six. On some estimates, English texts now account for up to one-fifth of the country's entire book sales. Though foreign publishers must license books to Chinese publishers, almost half the English-teaching market involves the purchase of foreign copyright.

There is also an increasing call for high-tech teaching. At its kindergartens, Beijing's municipal government has just started testing interactive whiteboards made by a British firm, Promethean. At 33,000 yuan ($4,125) a go, they enable teachers to integrate traditional materials with movie clips, radio broadcasts and other internet content. Nicole de Lalouvière, the director of learning at the British Council in Beijing, claims its website, managed with a Chinese partner and offering free tests, vocabulary and business English, has become “the biggest online university in the world”, with 2m students

Testing is also growing fast, as students with overseas ambitions practise for international college-entrance exams, and Chinese employers seek proof of English ability. Once again, foreigners are in pole position, though the two main suppliers, ETS and a venture between the British Council and Cambridge Assessment, are run as not-for-profit organisations. Teacher training promises to become another big market, given the shortage of half a million English teachers in state schools and Beijing's push to improve English ahead of the 2008 Olympics.

Finally, there are the private language schools themselves—some 50,000 of them, reckons Ms Pearlman, from family-run outfits to chains such as English First, Wall Street English and New Oriental, a Chinese operator that claims to be the biggest, with 2.5m enrolled students. While such schools were established for adults, the demand today is from parents willing to spend up to half their household income to boost their offspring's chances. The 550 students at English First's Shenzhen school used mostly to be adults; now more than 70% are children. And they are getting younger. The rage at kindergarten these days is English-speaking classes for four-year-olds.

Adults and college students, meanwhile, can choose from the many business-English classes at foreign colleges, such as the universities of Illinois, Maryland and Nottingham, which are establishing MBA courses and even entire campuses in China to tap into the huge numbers of potential students.

Yet not all this readily translates into profit. Education remains highly regulated. It is no accident that the state propaganda department controls the ministry of education, which only recently allowed (heavily edited) English textbooks from foreign publishers into the state system. Foreigners still cannot publish in China, receiving only royalties on their content. Their partners (such as FLTRP) use their materials to do a roaring business training teachers and running conferences. Though selling books to private language-schools can be more lucrative, these schools are also shackled. Foreign chains need a Chinese partner and must have their teaching materials approved. The difficulties and costs prompted English First to franchise all but four of its 68 schools: after a decade in China it has yet to recoup its investment.

The Chinese government is not entirely comfortable with western teaching methods. China has no government drive to welcome native English speakers, unlike Japan, where the ministry of education runs the 19-year-old JET programme, which puts thousands of foreign teachers to work in state schools. Indeed, until a few years ago, private language schools in China could be fined for hiring foreign English teachers.

Although China's passion for English is palpable, it will become a lucrative and open market only if China's Communist Party allows it to. It is reluctant because, along with English textbooks and teachers come western ways of learning and thinking—ways that might one day threaten the party's authority.