Over a third of international students in Delft stay in the Netherlands after they graduate

International students in Delft don’t immediately pack their bags once they have their Dutch diploma. Five years later, nearly four in ten are still in the Netherlands. Only international students in Eindhoven tend to stay more often. Nationwide, around 30 percent remain after five years, according to a new report (in Dutch) from the internationalisation organisation Nuffic.

In Delft, the percentage is higher: 38.7 percent of international students in Delft still live in the Netherlands five years after their graduation date.   Not just Delft students, but technical internationals in general tend to stay often. With 49 percent still living in the Netherlands after five years, Eindhoven tops the list.

The research by Nuffic shows that especially non-European students stay. They cite employment opportunities as a key reason for staying. 80 percent of them have a paid job, most often in and around Amsterdam, in the Delft/Rotterdam/The Hague region, Utrecht, or Eindhoven.

More students registered

The share of students staying in the Netherlands is slightly higher than in previous studies, but this doesn’t necessarily mean that internationals are staying more often. Researchers have better visibility of internationals because they are registering more frequently than before with the municipality where they live. If this is accurate, the  so-called stay probability of students might previously have been underestimated, Nuffic says.

The fact that so many international students stay in the Netherlands is profitable, say economists. It contributes an estimated 1.5 billion euros per year to the national treasury. However, the government wants to reduce the number of international students coming to the Netherlands. One of the ways they aim to achieve this is by offering fewer English-taught and more Dutch-taught bachelor programs. For now, this has no direct impact on TU Delft.