Komentari: Brain gain - Why no perks for academics?

Saya mahu buat komen atas luahan ini tetapi ketika draf entry ini dibuat, saya agak sibuk. Tangguh hingga lupa wujudnya draf entry ini. Luahan asal dari NST pada bulan May yang lepas.

Intipati sebenar luahan ini adalah kita menggoda mereka yang jauh sedangkan yang dekat disisihkan.

Mungkin perlu yang dekat ini berhijrah ke luar dahulu selama beberapa tahun dan apabila datangnya tawaran lumayan, kembali ke tanahair? Adakah ini strateginya?

Memang upah lumayan dapat diterima apabila di luar negara. Di Adelaide, rumah para professional ada kolam renang. Itu tak masuk harga kereta yang murah dan rumah banglo yang standard. Apabila fikir suasana sekolah anak-anak juga yang sangat baik, ini menambah godaan.

Ramai juga yang berhijrah atas sebab semata-mata memikirkan standard persekolahan anak-anak yang tinggi. The only reason they moved!

30 tahun turun naik sekolah dan universiti. Tak ramai yang sanggup. Ramai prefer untuk kerja secepat mungkin. Kalau boleh selepas SPM ataupun Ijazah Pertama. Sekolah dan universiti mahu ditinggalkan secepat mungkin.


Saya tambah lagi dari ayat terakhir pengadu - Or, maybe, I am not grateful - dengan "Or maybe I have to wait until the end of my service term (bond with sponsorship) before I make my move to overseas."


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I AM a professor. Perhaps I suffer from grandiosity but I would like to believe that in the last 20 years or so since I became an academic, after studying for many years locally and abroad to obtain a doctoral degree, I have contributed to nation-building.

I taught undergraduate and postgraduate professional courses that helped produce doctors, pharmacists, nurses and others.


I supervised and graduated local and international scientists at the master's, PhD and post-doctoral levels, performing research and made friends with some renowned researchers.


I thought people like me -- the academics -- have contributed much to the nation.

However, every day I hear news about efforts to bring home Malaysian scientists from abroad to help in nation-building, giving them one incentive after another.


I also hear about how much teachers have contributed and how pivotal their roles are in training our human resources. Said to have been neglected before, they are now showered with reward after reward and perks.


I am just wondering if indeed we academics have not contributed and if our needs have always been taken care of.


Returning scientists are given rebates and provided with facilities to continue contributing.


This is presumably over and above the perks that are better than perks given to academics who had opted to return home after completing their studies abroad, some from renowned universities as well, thinking that their nation needed them more than the employers abroad who were willing to pay them several times more than what they would have earned if they returned home.


And then "super" and "great" teachers are given salaries in the civil service's "Jusa" category, salaries that are beyond the reach of many academics except those who become professors after years of studies, teaching, research and publications.


Perhaps, I should have opted not to get higher degrees to teach in universities. I should have just stopped at my first degree and become a teacher and be rewarded equally well, if not better, and get the opportunity to teach in tuition classes earning an additional RM10,000 (yes, my teacher friend gets RM12,000 a month teaching Mathematics and Physics in tuition classes at his home).


Or perhaps, I should have remained abroad to enjoy the good salary and life there and only return now to Malaysia for the many rewards that await me.


Or, maybe, I am not grateful.