BEIJING, China-based online English platform 51Talk plans to hire some 100,000 Filipino teachers who will instruct English in the next three to five years, in response to the huge demand in online education in the world’s biggest socialist state.
“This is a great contribution to Philippine-Chinese relations,” said Ambassador of the People’s Republic of China Huang Xilian in a recent online press briefing.
“China’s emerging industries such as online education under the pandemic have catalyzed a new win-win cooperation model for China and the Philippines,” Huang explained. “On the one hand, it has helped [my country’s] distance education; on the other, it has provided a large number of online job opportunities for…[Filipinos].”
As a well-known online English-education company in China, Huang shared that 51Talk has fully tapped talents from the Philippines in the past several years. With the help of online digital technology, the firm has opened a window for thousands of Chinese children to communicate with foreign teachers worldwide, as it has created a “worthwhile online platform for China-Philippines educational cooperation.”
Meanwhile, Ambassador to China Jose Santiago Sta. Romana revealed how learning a language opens new opportunities and helps broaden perspectives while enriching experiences.
“Learning a language helps bridge the present embodied by our youth to a future…full of opportunities for their personal development, that of their families and their communities,” Sta. Romana noted.
The Filipino envoy was pleased that 51Talk is giving an opportunity to 20,000 competent local educators who will take part in nurturing the eagerness of nearly 300,000 young Chinese people to learn English.
“This educational exchange, albeit virtual, provides an enabling environment for cultural exchange between Filipinos and the Chinese,” Sta. Romana averred. “As the demand for online-based learning surges in China brought about by the new normal, it is my hope that more doors will be opened up for more and more Filipino educators in the same mutually beneficial manner.”
The program featured outstanding Chinese students who demonstrated their excellent English communication skills honed by 51Talk’s online English teachers based in the Philippines.
For his part, 51Talk CEO and cofounder Jack Huang expressed the important role of the online education platform in promoting the bilateral cooperation and exchanges between China and the Philippines.
“Sino-Philippine relations have grown ever more vibrant, with fruitful cooperation outcomes in various fields, particularly on the education front. And we at 51Talk are very happy to have contributed to the strengthening of the ties of our two countries through online education,” said Huang in his speech.
To help alleviate the ensuing unemployment from the pandemic, 51Talk activated several campaigns to spread awareness of the livelihood opportunities available in the platform to attract 30,000 online English teachers. And as part of its corporate social responsibility, the learning firm donated P5.25 million worth of medical equipment and supplies to several hospitals in the Philippines to aid in their efforts to combat the dreaded disease.
“Through 51Talk, Filipino online teachers are well-received among Chinese families,” added Huang. “Chinese parents understand that Filipinos share their roots from Asia, and that they have a better understanding of the Chinese culture, which helps them in teaching Chinese kids effectively.”
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Why the hell should we even be friends with China given the pandemic they unleashed on the planet which never had to be the case had they not arrested doctors and made journalists who reported on the virus disappear? Besides given the recent law passed in China threatening to shoot vessels from other countries we should never trust these b@$+@rd$, They clearly have no intention of being “friends”.