The House of Representatives voted in favour of a special student quota for international students on 15 February. A majority no longer wants to wait for outgoing Education Minister Robbert Dijkgraaf’s bill including the same measure.
The current selection procedures for popular courses for students can exacerbate inequality of opportunity. Higher education must do more to prevent this, says outgoing Education Minister Robbert Dijkgraaf. He anticipates that student selection will assume even greater importance in the future.
The House of Representatives needs to encourage companies to invest more in research and development. If not, the Netherlands will fall behind its competitors, warns a Knowledge Coalition representing Dutch business and higher education, including TU Delft.
More Dutch language-taught courses for undergraduates and fewer students coming from abroad? The initial response to universities’ own plans for achieving this goal is positive.
Around one in three first-year students at Dutch universities is from abroad, final figures show. At TU Delft, it is two out of five, though there are slightly fewer of them than before.
The universities will be creating a Dutch track for all major English-taught Bachelor’s programmes. Some programmes are even switching back to Dutch altogether.
If it’s up to the Dutch Education Council, outgoing Minister Robbert Dijkgraaf will take more time to think about his bill, which aims to reassert control over the internationalisation. This bill is creating too much uncertainty, says Chair Edith Hooge.