The Influence of Instructor Native Language on Learning and Instructor Ratings

The percentage of doctorates in economics awarded in the United States to US citizens has declined from 67.3 percent in 1977 to 55.7 percent in 1986 to 42.9 percent in 1996 [Siegfried and Stock, 1999]. This clearly implies that the number of economics instructors whose native language is not English has increased significantly. This paper seeks to determine the effect on student learning and instructor ratings when students are taught by an instructor whose native language is not English