We’ve got internationalisation under control, say universities. But then politicians need to drop the idea of a ‘language test’ for bachelor’s programmes.
In the Randstad (the western part of the country, Eds.), all psychology degrees are going back to Dutch – that’s the universities’ promise. Utrecht’s economics bachelor is switching to Dutch too. On top of that, universities across the country want to admit fewer students to English language bachelor’s degrees.
Altogether, this should mean around 2,000 fewer international students in academic bachelor’s programmes compared to the 2022/2023 peak. That would leave roughly 16,766 international first-years. (The drop has already started – there are expected to be about 700 fewer international students this year.)
In return for this ‘self-management’ approach, universities want the Government to scrap the planned language test requirement for existing bachelor’s programmes taught in English. But under the proposed Internationalisation in Balance legislation, every programme offering an English language bachelor would still have to justify itself.
Initially, the political parties PVV, VVD, NSC and BBB wanted to save EUR 293 million a year by cutting the number of English language programmes (and international students). After a compromise with the Christian opposition parties and JA21, that figure dropped to EUR 168 million a year – with over 60% of the savings coming from the university sector, and the rest from universities of applied sciences (HBOs).
HOP, Bas Belleman
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