Dear Colleagues,
I begin the New Year message by wishing you and your loved ones a very
Happy New Year 2015.
As we move into 2015, it is time to look back as well as look ahead.
The Year of 2014 was an indeed a year of reflection, restraint and
rehabilitation. While we had seen our beloved campus being inundated
with flood waters in 2011; most of 2012 saw AIT being submerged by the
issue of legality arising out of the New Charter, and the unpleasant
rows between the former President and our alumni. Though AIT returned
to its original legal status on 12 December 2012 (as a non-profit
international post-graduate institute), the crisis left AIT on the
brink of financial collapse. In 2013, we tried to come to grips with
the chaos that had been created.
The Year 2014 finally brought us a bright ray of hope. As we start
2015, you will be delighted to know that the financial forecast at the
end of 2014 has shown signs of sharp recovery. We are now moving in the
right direction, with renewed strength and vigor. We have been able to
plug the leaks, and halt the financial bleeding that took us on a
downhill path from 2009-2012.
I am extremely grateful to the Board of Trustees and all its
Committees for the extreme attention that they have paid to the
Institute. I am especially proud of our faculty and staff for their
understanding and sacrifice, as we jointly made efforts to resolve the
worst crisis in the 55-year old history of our beloved institute.
In 2014, we gradually regained the trust of our strategic partners,
especially our host country, Thailand. Thailand has resumed its annual
budget allocation to AIT, and we have secured support under the 10th
5-year Cooperation Plan of the Royal Thai Government (RTG). AIT will be
provided an annual budget for the next five years in the form of Royal
Scholarships and RTG Fellowships.
The Year 2015 shall be a year of a concerted focus on income
generation. An AIT business plan will be developed in line with the
Vision provided by the Board Chair. This will allow us to re-establish
and enhance our faculty strength. In this regards, the Executive
Committee has already outlined a policy for an international open
selection of the deans, which may require a premium compensation
package.
The Year 2015 will also witness a greater diversification of its
funding sources to complement the existing donor-driven model. We have
made a solid start in this direction courtesy of our industrial
relationships. Worthy of special mention is the new partnership model
established with the Thai Pipe Industry Co., Ltd. (Thai Pipe), a
business entity driven by our doctoral alumnus, Dr. Yanyong
Phataralaoha. Thai Pipe is the largest producer of PVC pipes in the
region, and it has earned tremendous goodwill due to its Corporate
Social Responsibility (CSR) activities. Aimed at human resources
development, Thai Pipe has established a Thai Pipe Scholarship (TPS)
Fund at AIT, to support students from Indochina and Myanmar year after
year. For the first year, the TPS Fund will provide three (3) bond-free
full scholarships to students from Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar.
Many other private companies have also started providing various kinds
of supports to AIT including scholarships to AIT students, and I must
thank Siam Cement Group (SCG), Regional Container Lines (RCL), Panya
Consultants, Index International, Pruksa Real Estate, Chevron Asia
South, SPS Global Corporation, Bhagya Enterprises and Chai Patthana
Foundation among others. Most of them are in Thailand, but I look
forward to expand the list with non-Thai Corporates in the
future.
The Year 2015 will also see a full-fledged effort at reinvigorating
its beautiful campus. AIT has already spent 297 million Baht (from its
flood compensation total of 440 million Baht) over the past two years,
which has helped to bring the campus back to life after the devastating
floods.
However, much more needs to be done before AIT can return to its
glorious past. After our financial situation showed an improvement in
2014, the Administration received an endorsement from the Executive
Committee to use the remainder of the insurance money (133 million
Baht) to completely overhaul our 40-year-old aging infrastructure, as
well as modernize the AIT Library. The library modernization plan will
however require that the AIT Administration raises an additional 31
million Baht (details in Attachment # 1).
The original AIT Library was constructed with funds donated by the
Government of Japan in 1981, and it acquired a face-lift in 2007,
courtesy of support from the AIT Alumni Association (AITAA). It was an
example of a typical university library built at that time, with
bookshelves dominating the ground floor and special collections being
showcased on the upper floor. After the flood, the library received an
allocation of 10 million Baht from insurance compensation for repairing
its ground floor. The repair could have been completed in a simple
straightforward manner, if AIT wanted to maintain the library in the
same old form and format. However, today’s library users (faculty,
researchers and students) access, process, and use information in a
manner totally different from the practices followed 40 years ago when
this AIT library was designed and built.
Today, libraries are no longer places to merely browse books or to
complete assignments. Instead modern libraries have emerged as places
for immersive learning and meeting places for academic discussion and
intellectual reflection; where media centers, digital repositories, and
wonders of modern architecture and design converge to create a
stimulating atmosphere. Thus, it is a good opportunity for the AIT
library to be modernized to cater to the 21st century needs of the
students. Hence, they can avail of new and amazing services, benefit
from emerging technologies, while simultaneously utilizing the
tailor-made spaces to study and collaborate. Some of the new ideas in
the modernization are included in the same Attachment.
In this regard, I would humbly seek your full cooperation and
whole-hearted support for the library modernization plan. We need your
help to identify some companies who may be able to make a donation from
their CSR fund. For major corporates, a contribution of 5-10 million
Baht (150k-300k USD) will result in the library zone being named after
your company. The company will also get permanent library membership,
and your staff can benefit from online access to all learning resources
from your work place. For medium to small size companies, they may
consider a donation of 1 million Baht, and a discussion room in the
Library will be renamed after your company.
For individual faculty and staff members, a token Baht 15,000 (USD
500) donation up will be acknowledged by a permanent inscription of
your name in the Hall-of-Fame Wall of the library. Even smaller
donations are welcome, as the act of participation is more important
than the quantum of the gift. You could send the gift directly to AIT
as detailed in attachment. Please consider that your donation is a
salute to the tremendous spirit of this glorious institute. Your gift
not only helps create permanent infrastructure, but it also contributes
towards building the future of the next generation.
Please feel free to share your thoughts with me.
And I promise that while 2014 was a year of reflection, 2015 will be a
transformative year for AIT.
Happy New Year 2015.
With kind regards,
Professor Worsak Kanok-Nukulchai
AIT President
Library Modernization Plan. Download from this link.
Contribution form: Download from this link.