To leave Delft or not?

The second-year however is completely the opposite: one day you’re perhaps quietly working at the campus library, but the next day you’re engaged in limitless meetings with thesis advisors in neighboring towns. Moving around during the MSc program’s second-year costs us time and money, but many of us choose to go with the flow.

3mE’s biomechanical engineering department is one of many across TU Delft that advocates inter-institutional research for MSc theses. Students are encouraged to undertake research projects at one of TU Delft’s hospital partners, like the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC). “They’re 5 euros apart!” exclaims Nishant Jain, a second-year biomechanical Design student who recently started his work at LUMC. “It shouldn’t be so often, but I will go [to Leiden] about ten times this month, which is still a lot.” Although daily trips to and from Delft aren’t required of him, the tours quickly become drawn-out and add up financially.

Meanwhile, our German neighbors offer attractive transportation passes to their international MSc students, allowing them to use most local buses, trams and trains for free in Germany. As a TU Delft international student in Delft, taking advantage of the public transportation system is limited to discounted passes that require an additional annual fee. Consequently, leaving Delft for any purpose, draws on our financial resources.

With this in mind, many of our cohorts have chosen to stay in Delft. “Many students from Delft already come here from all over the world. We’re not really looking to move again,” said Daniel Baldacchino, a second-year MSc Sustainable Energy Technology student who decided to stay in Delft for his research project. While financial reasons weren’t a main concern in Baldacchino’s ultimate decision to remain in Delft, he sympathized with the burden of coordinating the moves that would come with selecting an off-site research project.

No matter which way the economic wind is blowing, the typical international student chooses his or her work site based primarily on where the project is most interesting, with money matters taking a secondary role.

Martina Cuschieri, a second-year MSc student in computational tissue biomechanics and implants, decided to stay in Delft because the project fit her research interests the most, among the other offers, two of which came from outside Delft: “It just turned out that I could stay in Delft, which is easier than traveling.”

Comparatively, Haoxan Li, a second-year MSc biomechatronics student will move to Eindhoven, to be nearer to the company where he’ll carry out his experiments. Li and his MSc advisors acknowledged that regularly taking trains between Eindhoven and Delft would be less economical than taking an apartment in Eindhoven. For

Cuschieri and Li, they followed their research interests first, and arranged the logistics of their projects second. In Li’s case, the way to minimize the time and money spent on the next phase of his MSc program was simply to move from Delft.

While TU Delft faculties of course offer interesting projects on the Delft campus, nonetheless the opportunity to leave our newly established home in the second-year of MSc programs is one that many ambitious students are forced to consider from both an academic and logistical standpoint.

The Mechanical Brain

Kunnen we nu dankzij supercomputers waanzinnige 3D-films maken en ingewikkelde berekeningen doen aan luchtstromingen, zestig jaar geleden hadden we nog aparte apparaten nodig om op te tellen en te vermenigvuldigen. Dergelijke rekenmachines zijn nu te zien in de TU Library in de tentoonstelling ‘The Mechanical Brain’, die is samengesteld door IO-studenten.