Nibs

Sidney Frank attended Brown 60 years ago but dropped out before graduating, because he couldn’t pay the high tuition fees. Frank went on to make his fortune importing drinks like Jaegermeister. Frank will give the money to the neediest undergraduate students as scholarships, eliminating the need for loans. Brown currently charges $31,000 a year for tuition and $8,000 for room and board.
House sales

Stimulated by fiscal policies, many Dutch citizens have decided to buy a house in the last fifteen years. But the demand for expensive houses will soon decline, predicts researcher Harry Boumeester of the TU’s OTB Institute. Boumeester examined the prices of expensive houses in the period 1975 to 2000. His definition of an expensive house is that according to 2003 prices, the house would cost at least 290,000 euros. Boumeester’s research was prompted by a government public housing plan that established policies to stimulate house ownership. The government had assumed that consumers demand would be for expensive houses. Boumeester examined how demand evolved and which factors influenced it. It turns out that developments like attractive mortgages rates made the demand for more expensive houses rise. But since 1998, the prices of houses are rising much faster than the amounts of money people can borrow. The economic recession also makes people hesitant to buy an expensive house. Boumeester advises the government to build cheaper, but not too cheap. In future, he expects prices to fall slightly.
Protest

Last Tuesday, ‘Prinsjesdag’, Queen Beatrix outlined the government’s future plans, which included financial cuts for most Dutch workers. Trade unions responded by organising national protest meetings, aiming to motivate people to attend the major demonstration in Amsterdam on October 2. At TU Delft, about 100 employees attended a protest meeting at the Aula. Not very impressive, but the trade union members still had reasons to cheer: TU Executive Board member Paul Rullmann offered wholehearted support for their actions and said the government was acting like an unreliable insurance company.
Blackboard explosion

Use of TU Delft’s Blackboard is set to break every record this year. During the first week of the academic year, the number of page views was higher than ever. This trend is expected to continue. The first week of September is traditionally the busiest time of year in terms of Blackboard use, says Willem van Valkenburg, one of the administrators and developers of the TU’s Blackboard. But interest was never as great as this. On the first Monday of the academic year there were ‘just’ 200,000 page views. On Tuesday, that number increased to 310,000, on Wednesday it was 400,000. On Thursday and Friday the number of page views was even higher than that. Last September, the number of page views was significantly lower. The increase is owing to the growing interest among students, Van Valkenburg believes: “They log in at much larger numbers, at all the faculties. It may have something to do with the fact that more and more teachers use the Blackboard.”
English-only zones

To prepare Filipino students to compete in the global economy, Manila’s city university has designated ‘English-only zones’ on the campus during certain hours. The campus has been divided into language zones. The university’s 10,000 students must speak in English in designated ‘English Zones’ during certain English-speaking hours. There are also ‘Free Zones’, where students may speak in any language they wish. “We want to create an environment where if you speak in Filipino in English Zones, you won’t get an answer,” university president Benjamin Tayabas said. English Zones include classrooms, faculty lounges, offices and corridors, where students and staff must converse in English from 9 to 12 a.m. and from 2 to 4 p.m. Classrooms and offices have been designated as strictly English-only areas, where students and teachers must always speak English. The ‘Free Zones’ include the university canteen, restrooms and gymnasium. “We hope a higher proficiency in English results in more jobs for our students,” Tayabas said.
Drop out

A man who dropped out of prestigious Brown University (US) gave the university $100 million, its largest gift ever. Sidney Frank attended Brown 60 years ago but dropped out before graduating, because he couldn’t pay the high tuition fees. Frank went on to make his fortune importing drinks like Jaegermeister. Frank will give the money to the neediest undergraduate students as scholarships, eliminating the need for loans. Brown currently charges $31,000 a year for tuition and $8,000 for room and board.

Drop out

A man who dropped out of prestigious Brown University (US) gave the university $100 million, its largest gift ever. Sidney Frank attended Brown 60 years ago but dropped out before graduating, because he couldn’t pay the high tuition fees. Frank went on to make his fortune importing drinks like Jaegermeister. Frank will give the money to the neediest undergraduate students as scholarships, eliminating the need for loans. Brown currently charges $31,000 a year for tuition and $8,000 for room and board.
House sales

Stimulated by fiscal policies, many Dutch citizens have decided to buy a house in the last fifteen years. But the demand for expensive houses will soon decline, predicts researcher Harry Boumeester of the TU’s OTB Institute. Boumeester examined the prices of expensive houses in the period 1975 to 2000. His definition of an expensive house is that according to 2003 prices, the house would cost at least 290,000 euros. Boumeester’s research was prompted by a government public housing plan that established policies to stimulate house ownership. The government had assumed that consumers demand would be for expensive houses. Boumeester examined how demand evolved and which factors influenced it. It turns out that developments like attractive mortgages rates made the demand for more expensive houses rise. But since 1998, the prices of houses are rising much faster than the amounts of money people can borrow. The economic recession also makes people hesitant to buy an expensive house. Boumeester advises the government to build cheaper, but not too cheap. In future, he expects prices to fall slightly.
Protest

Last Tuesday, ‘Prinsjesdag’, Queen Beatrix outlined the government’s future plans, which included financial cuts for most Dutch workers. Trade unions responded by organising national protest meetings, aiming to motivate people to attend the major demonstration in Amsterdam on October 2. At TU Delft, about 100 employees attended a protest meeting at the Aula. Not very impressive, but the trade union members still had reasons to cheer: TU Executive Board member Paul Rullmann offered wholehearted support for their actions and said the government was acting like an unreliable insurance company.
Blackboard explosion

Use of TU Delft’s Blackboard is set to break every record this year. During the first week of the academic year, the number of page views was higher than ever. This trend is expected to continue. The first week of September is traditionally the busiest time of year in terms of Blackboard use, says Willem van Valkenburg, one of the administrators and developers of the TU’s Blackboard. But interest was never as great as this. On the first Monday of the academic year there were ‘just’ 200,000 page views. On Tuesday, that number increased to 310,000, on Wednesday it was 400,000. On Thursday and Friday the number of page views was even higher than that. Last September, the number of page views was significantly lower. The increase is owing to the growing interest among students, Van Valkenburg believes: “They log in at much larger numbers, at all the faculties. It may have something to do with the fact that more and more teachers use the Blackboard.”
English-only zones

To prepare Filipino students to compete in the global economy, Manila’s city university has designated ‘English-only zones’ on the campus during certain hours. The campus has been divided into language zones. The university’s 10,000 students must speak in English in designated ‘English Zones’ during certain English-speaking hours. There are also ‘Free Zones’, where students may speak in any language they wish. “We want to create an environment where if you speak in Filipino in English Zones, you won’t get an answer,” university president Benjamin Tayabas said. English Zones include classrooms, faculty lounges, offices and corridors, where students and staff must converse in English from 9 to 12 a.m. and from 2 to 4 p.m. Classrooms and offices have been designated as strictly English-only areas, where students and teachers must always speak English. The ‘Free Zones’ include the university canteen, restrooms and gymnasium. “We hope a higher proficiency in English results in more jobs for our students,” Tayabas said.
Drop out

A man who dropped out of prestigious Brown University (US) gave the university $100 million, its largest gift ever. Sidney Frank attended Brown 60 years ago but dropped out before graduating, because he couldn’t pay the high tuition fees. Frank went on to make his fortune importing drinks like Jaegermeister. Frank will give the money to the neediest undergraduate students as scholarships, eliminating the need for loans. Brown currently charges $31,000 a year for tuition and $8,000 for room and board.