Average Salary For University Lecturers?

[jstrike]

I'm going to follow this thread. I actually am trying to get a job at a college or university. Visa won't be a problem for me and i have a good reference from an associate professor at Chula. However, most job vacancies i have seen require one to be native English speaker (sometimes even going as far as listing countries of which you need to have a passport of). I'm however Dutch but have a good command of the English language (I guess it's called "near-native"?). Does anyone know how stringent they are?

BTW it appears that the larger universities don't promote jobs on their site. Is there any way to find out if there are vacancies?

[shaun86]

Hi guys,

Just on the topic of university teaching.. I was wondering if anyone could describe the working conditions, facilities provided etc... Do foreign teachers at Thai unis have their own offices? Consultation times? Easy access to printing, photocopying and so on? In general, how would you describe 'life' at these universities?

Thanks!

[paully]

I was wondering if anyone could describe the working conditions, facilities provided etc... Do foreign teachers at Thai unis have their own offices? Consultation times? Easy access to printing, photocopying and so on? In general, how would you describe 'life' at these universities?

Thanks!

It varies enormously from university to university. Some are modern with huge, new well-equipped buildings, some old with poky buildings. Unlikely to have your own office, more likely to share. Photocopying can be an issue depending on budgets, especially at government unis. Consultation times are usually about 6 hours a week at government unis (better ones allow you to choose these yourself); private unis often want teachers to keep to fixed hours on campus.

Edited March 29, 2010 by paully

[Yimmy]

can pick up extra work for relatively good pay- 1000B+ an hour is not unusual

Except that this extra work will be illegal (without a WP) and should not be discussed on TV.

[shaun86]

Thanks for the info, appreciate it. Would you say in general it's harder to find positions within the better unis (low turnover, etc)? And would most strictly require PhD applicants - versus others with, for example, Masters degrees?

Cheers!

[scorecard]

Thanks for the info, appreciate it. Would you say in general it's harder to find positions within the better unis (low turnover, etc)? And would most strictly require PhD applicants - versus others with, for example, Masters degrees?

Cheers!

Can I suggest you go back to the start of this thread (only two pages) and read all the posts, this should give you a good comprehensive answer to your above question and I guess quite a lot of other valuable surrounding details.

Unless you have a good contact inside a university, yes it's not all that easy to get started.

Following is a fairly common picture:

- Call the university and ask to speak to the dean or director etc.

Reply - Why, what do you want? etc. Eventually who might get the response 'Please send an e.mail and attach your resume'. The e.mail address you will be given is very probably an assistant. And in many institutions the assistant makes the decision whether to forward your e.mail to the next level up.

- With luck, if your qualifications and experience are solid and valuable to the uni., you'll probably get an interview, but also remember that some deans / directors are only focused on having enough faculty right now, others take a longer term approach and might see you as a potential for the future, meaning of course that it wont be until the next semester that you might be considered for an actual class (this could be many months). It can be a long and slow process.

Another factor is whether the uni. has already prepared it's teaching schedules and has already assigned lecturers to all of the classes. At my uni., this is all finished about three months before a semester or summer program starts.

Another point in the puzzle is that many of the programs taught in English (the so called 'International' programs) are taught by Thai lecturers. Most unis are not likely to push their long-term proven Thai lecturers out just to give a course to a new farang. Further, Thai lecturers are paid, in most cases, less than half of what farang lecturers are paid (even for programs taught in English) therefore a uni., which is watching it's operating costs very closely will stay with their Thai lecturers as much as possible.

To be honest, at my uni (I work in the business school) there are many very capable very amiable Thai lecturers who speak English at native speaker or very very close to native speaker level. (If they speak 'broken English' in the class room, many of the students will quickly complain, and, at least at my uni., many of the students studied all of high school in the UK, Australia, NZ, Singapore, US, plus many of them learnt English at expensive schools in Thailand where they were exposed to professional English learning from Kindergarden, even studying Primary school, in Thailand, in English, and their English today is often native speaker level, so they can detect very quickly that the teacher is speaking 'broken English').

Most Thai lecturers are employed on a long-term contract but there are annual performance checks - and in most cases they are required to have at least two (the number varies) pieces of research published in a recognised international journal every year. Student assessments of each lecturer are also taken very seriously.

- On the other hand, if the uni., is looking for more international accreditations then this point is often reversed. Today many Thai unis., are looking for further 'international' accreditations, often from European accreditation bodies (EQUIS is one example).

(All of the accreditation orgs., require that the uni offers a large number of programs in English as well as in the local native language, and they also require that the unis., have a large range of visiting academics, and also require that a large number of courses have several lecturers. An additional requirement is that the the uni., which is applying for the accreditation must already have exchange agreements with numerous credible unis., in other countries and there must be a satisfactory track record of actual exchanges.)

Every institution is a little different but they must untimately stay strictly within the specific regulations set out by the Thai ministry of university affairs, and other bodies.

Most institutions would require a masters degree and good broad experience for lecturers teaching undergraduate classes. To teach masters level programs some require masters level garaduates and experience, some require Ph.D. graduates and experience.

If you do get an interview then please make sure you follow the expected dress, politeness, grooming etc. 'code'.

The 'high qaulity' unis., are very serious about work permits (at least mine is). In my institution the admin., staff (quite professional people, all speak advanced English) do all of the work to prepare the necessary work permit application documents and take the farang to the labour ministry. But all costs at the labour ministry are born by the lecturer. The work permit is quite specific as to position and if the uni moves you to another section then the work permit must be cancelled and a new work permit issued for the new position (I've been through this personally).

Sorry this post is somewhat additional to the specific scope of your question, but I hope it's useful.

Edited April 2, 2010 by scorecard

[poskat]

I work at a major univ in bkk. i have my own office, 6 hrs per week office hours, didnt pay for the work permit. i have phd and clinical degrees from Unis in the USA.I'm off today. They contacted me, as some friends there knew I was looking for an SEA job.

Edited April 2, 2010 by poskat