Private universities go faculty-shopping abroad

MUMBAI: For long, only India’s premier institutes flew out to shop for faculty members. The IITs and the IIMs through their deep alumni networks attracted many teachers from campuses around the world and marshalled them to Indian campuses. Now, however, private Indian universities too have joined the bandwagon. They are holding recruitment weeks around the world looking for professors, full-time, visiting or in an advisory role.
The hunt often begins with an intense desire to bring back true-blue international faculty, the one that has circulated several campuses and is ready for a sunny “Indian chapter”.Meant to extend the universities’ boundaries of knowing, working and researching, international faculty also spearhead internationalisation for the campus.
The US and the UK are big on everyone’s radar, but the search extends beyond too.
Across the landscape of Indian private universities, there are faculty originating from several corners: from Syria to Singapore, Taiwan to Tanzania, from Hong Kong to Hungary. Professor Armin Rosencranz, a lawyer and political scientist from Princeton earlier taught at Berkeley and Stanford; professor Stephen Marks, a dean at Jindal School of Public Health and Human Development, lives on the Sonipat campus, and was formerly with Harvard T H Chan School of Public Health; Magdalena Golebiowska, who teaches western vocals, has taught in several universities but her treasured achievement was teaching at the African Music School in Central African Republic.
“We have been conducting recruitment drives in major cities in the US, UK, Canada and Australia and many other countries. Also, we conduct campus recruitment drives in top international universities such as Stanford University, Harvard University, Tufts University, University of Oxford, University of Cambridge, King’s College, and QMUL, among many others to hire faculty members,” said Jitu Mishra, chief operating officer and senior director HR, OP Jindal Global University (JGU).
Currently, 114 international faculty members from 46 different regions are working at JGU. At Plaksha University, 90% full-time faculty have international experience; 12 visiting faculty are international citizens. The university recently concluded a recruitment drive in the US across 7 cities in 15+ universities where they made presentations to postdoctoral fellows and PhDs, who may be interested in an Indian innings. Out of a total strength of 250 teachers, Shoolini University has 32 international faculty members, apart from 31 faculty members of Indian origin who have either taught or undertaken research in foreign universities.
“International faculty members are happy to live in India, and we are happy to have them as they give our students access to a vibrant academic and research environment. We have also provided accommodation to our foreign faculty members from the US, Taiwan, Syria and many other countries, either on the campus itself or some nearby location,” said P K Khosla, chancellor, Shoolini University.
At most other universities, too, international faculty members generally come in visiting and part-time roles, and some even spend their entire sabbatical. Then, there is the diaspora academics that immigrated from one country to another, often obtained citizenship in that country, and are lured “home”. Perks often include a higher compensation package, research grants, funding for conferences, publication rewards, apart from accommodation, health insurance and other campus facilities.