Job Discussion Forums

[elmosian]

My husband and I are planning to move to HK from the US as soon as he lands a job over there. He is a native English speaker and will be getting his Phd by the end of this semester (may). He has been looking for an assistant professor job in the dept of education since last fall, but so far he hasn't had any luck yet. Here is my question: is it hard for him to land a professor job in hk without any publications yet? what about not being able to speak/read chinese a big deal? what kind of credential is he missing?

[RiverMystic]

I would say he has a small chance only. I have a PhD and have had two interviews at the HKIED. One was for a postdoc, the other for assistant professor. They didn't even bother to get back to me, which should tell you something about employer/employee relations in HK.

There are more uni jobs coming through now, as the education system has changed, making high school a year shorter, and uni time a year longer.

I spent a lot of time writing and publishing - two books and 30-odd journal papers. I developed entire 100 page programmes, and sent them in with job applications, only to receive two-sentence rejection slips without even a name on them. Nothing seems to make any difference.

But it also depends upon your research focus. If you have a bog-standard research area - say curriculum development - your chances are better.

I've pretty much given up on uni jobs. Eight years of endless work for no result is simply pointless.

[elmosian]

oh wow, that's very discouraging to hear he has next to no chance. Could you further elaborate what makes you think that way? We understand that universities in HK are research-oriented and that's why they look at publication records so heavily. My husband is determined to produce at least 3-4 publication within a year as soon as he finishes up his dissertation.

His research interest is in education technology and distance/e-learning/usability testing. Shouldn't that be pretty popular among the universities in HK? In addition, his Phd degree will be from one of the big 10 universities in America (which happened to be one of the top education technology in the country). Would that make any difference?

[RiverMystic]

His chances improve if:

1) His institution has a name.
2) His doctorate is quantitative.
3) He has publications with journals creditable in his field.

So, give it a go if you like. Personally, I couldn't even get a part-time job at a community college here. I also know a Columbia PhD, with ten years tenure US-side who couldn't get a job in HK in his field (psych). He gave up and took a job in China. I do not recommend that course, as most mainland unis have very low pay, low standards, low expectations - but with little work involved.

[elmosian]

it's quite interesting to hear experiences from others. we just never thought about how difficult it would be to land a prof job in hk when we looked at their faculty's credentials. It's hard to believe that the quality of their current faculty (90% graduated from local HK universities) matches the extremely high standard they set for the applicants.

Do most universities in HK favor local applicants despite the fact that they don't speak english very well? Would it help if my husband did not need to apply for any visa to work in HK?

[RiverMystic]

I suppose for part-time jobs, a visa would be a requirement, and I'm not sure if they can give visas for part-time (so you may need some kind of working visa already). I think they do prefer local staff in many instances, but mainly for instructor positions. Many instructors have PhDs these days. An instructor is basically someone who shows up for work, teaches and marks papers, and gets none of the status or privileges of a real academic. They also get crap pay. I can get twice as much money working as high school teacher in HK.

But you can only try. Publishing is part of the game, so your husband will need to do that anyway, no matter where he works. So he should keep working on that area. I published even as I did my PhD. I had about 12 papers done by the time I got the PhD, including conference papers. That took an incredible amount of sacrifice and self-discipline (I worked full-time as well). I got up at 5am and worked before getting on the subway, and worked right up till I arrived at the school door (reading, writing on my lap-top), then the same when I went home, only to hit the books again till bed time. Considering the result in academia (no job) I'm sure you can appreciate why I feel let down by the system.

But I haven't given up. I now write and work on my own publications. There's probably a wider and more receptive audience in the general public for me anyway.

RM

PS - I went back and edited the prior posts. I wouldn't want others to think my experience would be the same for everyone - although people should be prepared for the strong possibility of failure.

[forest1979]

The chances of a new PhD holder scoring a job is not quite nil but near enough there, especially when the person has little or no publications. To do well in HK it's an advantage to have local contacts but to become a prof you need to demonstrate the ability to score external research grants, and the HK system works on applying for grants based on not only a solid research idea but an application backed up by a handful of publications to show what the candidate has done in a related field. Without the publications it is impossible for the application to be taken seriously.

Not being able to read Chinese is no obstacle. A lack of publications and research grants will be. Especially in the competitive market place that now exists. Oh, and HK is seriously competitive at the best of times. Its only a small place, with a small number of higher education institutions, some ranked consistently in the world's top 50 unis (e.g. by The Times), and has a neighbour with a hell of a lot of people who would kill to work and earn a HK salary.

[AjarnIam]

This is slightly off the OP's topic, but I have spoken with a few people in Japan who hold tenured university positions, even without completion of their PhD.

[Tiger Beer]

[forest1979]

If you have a grant it pays for conference trips, or you can apply in-house for funding.

As for teaching time that depends on the contract you have: it might be teaching 1, 2 or 3 courses per week.