News in Brief – Delta 27

In this early stage, the socialist party (SP) and the social-democratic party (PvdA) have already said ‘no’ to the plan. Other parties, including the coalition parties, have also not reacted very enthusiastically. The liberal VVD thinks a merger is unnecessary. The Christian Democrats (CDA) argue that small-scale education fits the Zeitgeist better. Meanwhile, the populist Freedom Party (PVV) is afraid that students’ freedom of choice will be constrained if the three universities eventually merge. Most parties, however, state that they will only give their final judgments if a new bill is passed. In order for the three universities to merge, an amendment is necessary. The Dutch House of Representatives therefore has

the final say.

Sustainable warning

Sustainability is inevitable, says Dr Karel Mulder (TPM), in an interview on Delta’s page 02. “The current use of materials and levels of emissions are untenable in the long run.” But what is sustainable technology? That’s the title and the main question of Dr Mulder’s latest book (Greenleaf Publishing, 2011). The case studies in his book show that the answer is not straightforward, but rather changes with time and that often different aspects or ‘articulations’ of sustainability are contradictory. Nonetheless, in the long run it’s either sustainability or catastrophe.

Student teachers

Harvard Professor Eric Mazur visited TU Delft last week to give a lecture, titled ‘Confessions of a converted teacher’. In this week’s interview, Mazur explains the origins of his Peer Instruction – having students explain key physics concepts to one another instead of lecturing about them himself. “I couldn’t understand what they did not understand,” he explains. Mazur, who is Dutch by origin, is not only known for his original didactics but also for Black Silicon – a promising spin-off from his optoelectronic labs.

PhD feedback

When asked about the process of preparing a doctorate, PhDs give TU Delft with a grade of 7.2. However, they are dissatisfied with many other things, such as the doctoral education, which is, in their opinion, unstructured. One of five PhDs is dissatisfied about the way supervision is organized and one in three PhDs say that TU Delft helps with career planning. The graduate schools should help tackle these problems. Last week, Rector Karel Luyben opened the first graduate schools at the faculty of Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Science; Industrial Design Engineering; and Architecture.

Lucky

According to an article in the Dutch newspaper, Nederlands Dagblad, more and more students are coming to the Netherlands from foreign countries and securing places in the most sought-after programmes at Dutch universities and polytechnics. These popular but oversubscribed courses include medicine and dentistry, for which prospective students must win a lottery to get a place. The newspaper reports that one in five first-year students enrolled in such courses had gained their places through winning these place-allotment lotteries. In 2010, some 18 percent of students in these courses came from abroad, while in 2006 that figure was just nine percent.

New dean

As of 1 December 2011, the Executive Board of the TU Delft has appointed Dr Bert Geerken as dean of the faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences. Dr Geerken studied Applied Physics at the University of Twente and gained his PhD at the VU University Amsterdam on a solid state physics subject. He is currently the interim Managing Director at the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience (NIN) of the KNAW (Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences). Before that, he was General Director of the Netherlands Centre for Biodiversity Naturalis. In 2000, Dr Geerken became a director of NWO (the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research).

Dual nationalities

A majority of Dutch people (60 percent) say that immigrants should have to give up their foreign passport when they acquire Dutch citizenship, according to survey conducted by Statistics Netherlands. Moreover, 70 percent believe government cabinet ministers should be forbidden from having dual citizenship. Among non-Western immigrants living in the Netherlands, 60 percent think dual nationality should be allowed. Only 1.1 million people of the current Dutch population of 16.5 million hold dual nationality.

Dat belooft wat, zeker omdat het in het persbericht van dik hout zaagt men planken gaat. Ronkende SP-taal. Robin Hood komt in Delft en andere steden topbestuurders van onderwijsinstellingen bestelen en het geld verdelen onder arme studenten. Het is in de ogen van de SP-jongeren ‘onacceptabel’ dat ‘onderwijsbobo’s ongestoord kunnen graaien’. CvB-voorzitter Van den Berg is er een van, want die verdient ‘zelfs 245.000 euro’, aldus Rood-woordvoerder Geert Roekaerts. En ze gaan ook flyeren. Natuurlijk. Op dus naar de bieb.

11.57 uur.
Er daagt een meisje op met een zwarte baret. Zou zij een van de Rood-folderaars zijn? “Het begint toch om 12 uur?” vraagt ze via haar 06.
12.04 uur.
Ze heeft gezelschap gekregen van twee kompanen. Geen van drieën weet waar ze nou moeten flyeren.
12.06 uur.
Zeven jonge socialisten staan klaar. Er komt uit een tas een doosje met pennen. Rode pennen. En ze hebben folders in hun hand. De kleur rood ontbreekt op hun drukwerk. Zijn het wel socialisten? Voor de zekerheid even binnenkijken of Rood de overval niet alsnog ín de bieb laat plegen. Daar stikt het immers van de studenten.
12.07 uur.
Weer buiten. Waar blijven Robin Hood en de CvB-voorzitter toch? Die zeven jongens en meiden met de flyers en de pennen kunnen we verder negeren. Die zijn van Lorre en promoten onder meer hun Halloween party en DJ Contest.
12.13 uur.
Toch maar weer even binnenkijken. Nee, alles rustig.
12.16 uur.
Bellen met het rode actiecentrum dan maar. Hier gaat iets mis. Straks blijken ze voor de Aula gestaan te hebben. Roekaerts neemt op. Nee, de actie was nog niet gestart. “Over een kwartiertje? ”