Dear Members of the AIT Community
and Stakeholders:
At the outset, I would like to express my sincere appreciation to
members of the AIT community and stakeholders, including alumni, former
faculty, partners and friends, for their support and encouragement on
my appointment as the new President of the Asian Institute of
Technology (AIT).
I am grateful to Dr. Subin Pinkayan, Chairman of the Board of
Trustees, and members of the Board of Trustees, Executive Committee and
the Presidential Search Committee, for their collective trust and
confidence, in their decision to appoint me as the 7th President,
during the Board of Trustees meeting held on 17 July 2014.
As communicated by the Board Chair, I recognize that I have the
obligation to steer AIT until it is in a good position to attract a new
world-class president. For me, it is indeed an honor, a challenge and a
golden opportunity as an alumnus to serve my alma mater at this most
critical juncture of history.
When AIT encountered the "crisis" in 2011-2012 following the historic
campus floods, I happened to be in a position that understood the
perspectives of all parties. As AIT's Vice President, I performed my
duty in voicing my honest opinions, time and again, that AIT cannot
operate outside the laws of its host country. I also expressed my
disagreement with the idea of strategic partnership with a for-profit
business entity, as this would compromise our non-profit status. I have
shared this sentiment with the alumni and the community, with one
sincere objective -- to save AIT.
I have served as Interim President for 1 full year since July 1, 2013,
at the behest of the Board, while there was a void in the leadership
position of the Institute. The past year has been occupied with
providing remedies for operational problems and morale building, while
struggling to survive under the Institute’s deflated financial
resources. During this interim period, I established my top
priorities as (a) to arrest the rapid sliding down of our finance, (b)
to regain the trust of the host country and resume its financial
support, and (c) to boost the morale of faculty and staff that has
apparently plummeted in recent years.
On the financial situation, as you may know, AIT suffered serious
financial deficits of 29 and 152 million Baht respectively in 2011 and
2012, depleting almost all of our remaining reserve. When I became
Interim President, we only had remaining 6 months to arrest this
alarming financial slide-down to save AIT from going bankrupt. With the
strong supports of the Audit and the Executive Committee and the
sacrifice of faculty and staff, we were able to implement a critical
cost-cutting measure to save AIT. At the end of 2013, our financial
result only showed a small deficit of 11 million Baht. We did realize
that cutting cost alone is not a sustainable solution, and will develop
a strategy for 2014 on-ward to find ways to increase our revenues which
will allow us to re-establish our capacities, in order to fulfil our
obligations to our students and partners.
Also under the guidance of the Board Chair, and the goodwill, support
and interventions of so many individuals, our relations with the host
country have returned to normal. The previous mistrust was so serious
that it took more than one and a half years after the Board of Trustees
resumed its function on 12 December 2012, for AIT to regain its
credibility. All members of the AIT community must be commended for
their patience, hard work and efforts as well as sacrifices made during
this most difficult period in the history of the Institute.
As already communicated, we are now entering into a new golden era of
cooperation with our host country. On 22 July 2014, the authority of
our host country has approved allocation of a special budget to
AIT in lieu of AIT’s missing budget in 2014. Although AIT has
returned to normalcy, the crisis has left a huge public scar that will
remain with us for many years. As advised by our Board Chair, it is
very important that we all forget about our differences in the past,
unite and work as one in order to ensure a future for AIT.
The morale of AIT faculty and staff in general has improved since the
ending of the turmoil, the resolution of the legal crisis, and the
encouragement from the financial recovery. However, reinvigorating
morale is in itself a process and the positive results cannot be
summarized immediately.
As AIT is a multi-cultural workplace, an impediment to morale is the
perception that policies and procedures of the Institute might not be
applied fairly and consistently to all employees. This might be the
weakness of our check and balance system as also pointed out in the
Fact-Finding Committee Report in 2013. Thus, before we move forward, it
is important to take lessons from the past. After consultation with the
Audit Committee, AIT Administration decided to engage an External
Consulting Expert to review the Internal Financial Control and the
Governance System of AIT based on the international best practices (see
Attachment 1). The results can lead to a revamp of AIT’s Bye-laws and
its Policy and Procedure Statements, as well as a restructuring of the
present Administration, in order to ensure a better
accountability.
Aside from administrative audit, it is also time for AIT to undergo an
academic audit to know where we stand against the best of the world.
Potential students always ask this question: “What is the ranking of
AIT?” AIT has not been ranked in the past as AIT is not
a full-fledged traditional university. Besides, AIT is an independent
international institute. Almost all major world university rankings
consider only academic institutes affiliated with a particular
country.
Under my direction, AIT has contacted the QS Intelligence Unit (QSIU)
to perform an audit of AIT’s overall academic activities under its QS
Stars program. QS Stars is a complementary companion to QS World
University Rankings — a rating system that facilitates the evaluation
of universities across a much broader range of criteria and with
respect to established thresholds rather than the performance of
others. The objectives are to allow institutions like AIT to shine,
irrespective of their size, shape and mission. By participating in the
QS Stars (see Attachment 2), AIT can better evaluate itself across a
wide spectrum of criteria, in order to make the required improvements,
as well as to communicate to the world its standings in different
areas.
High in my agenda is also how to enhance and showcase our
multicultural dimension. In the early days, AIT was the only
international postgraduate institution in Asia. The attractiveness of
AIT arose from its leadership in academic excellence and its truly
international nature. Over the past two decades, the quality and
standard of many national universities, with large amounts of resources
poured in by their respective governments, have advanced rapidly. The
only attribute that no other university in the region can emulate is
AIT’s true internationality. However, if we are too complacent, our
diversity advantage could erode rapidly. Thus I have made a strong
resolve to introduce an appropriate mechanism, which shall further
enhance our diversity, especially within our faculty body.
It is my belief that diversity breeds diversity, and my vision is to
see the composition of our faculty body being balanced by these 4
cultural groups: (1) ASEAN (2) South Asia (3) East Asia and (4) the
rest of the world. From now on, I wish to see our recruitment of
faculty takes this diversity model into account more
seriously.
During the interim period, there were also other issues that have been
duly addressed with, for which I shall elaborate to you in separate
mails, including court cases reconciliation; campus renovation and
upgrade; termination of costly outsource contracts; and Board Chair’s
idea of the 5-year engineering leadership and entrepreneurship
program.
In conclusion, I truly appreciate your trust and confidence in me.
While there are challenges ahead, AIT is reinventing itself, and I am
confident that we will rise to the occasion. The Institute still has an
unmatched brand name and legacy of having contributed to the Asian
miracle. I welcome your feedback and your participation in the journey
ahead and look forward to your strong and continued support to the
Institute.
Professor Worsak Kanok-Nukulchai
President
Asian Institute of Technology
(AIT)
17 August 2014