The internationalization strategy of the universities in the Netherlands dies of success.
The inability of the public administrations and the educational institutions themselves to manage the consequences of the enormous flow of international students who arrive in the country, attracted by the promise of quality teaching in English, has led the Government to propose changes for the 2024 academic year. -2025 which will mean that it will be necessary to speak Dutch to enroll in their centers.
Accommodation problems, the lack of teachers, the reduction of opportunities for national students and the drop in the educational level are some of the factors behind the plan advanced by the Minister of Education, Robbert Dijkgraaf, to Parliament and which should be approved in September. The initiative, however, has been poorly received by the educational community.
Currently, some 122,200 students enrolled in the universities of the Netherlands, 15% of the total, come from abroad, the majority from countries of the European Union. The figure triples the data for 2005 and illustrates the success of the internationalization strategy of its universities, which received an unexpected boost with Brexit. This year, in the first courses, the percentage rises to 40% of the total (42,000).
Access to housing has become one of the most pressing problems for the Dutch, a situation that also affects young people –foreign or national– who plan to study in the country and, at the last minute, find themselves without a place in the university residences and without the possibility of paying the high prices of the rooms in the private market. Given the lack of places in the residences, this summer the University of Amsterdam asked its students not to travel to the city unless they had secured their accommodation beforehand.
In parallel, the high cost of student life in the Netherlands has led many young Dutch people to enroll in Dutch-speaking universities in neighboring Belgium. There is one more problem that is more uncomfortable to talk about: students from the EU have as much right as the Dutch to receive scholarships and some parties question whether this is the best use of public resources.
Faced with this accumulation of problems, at the end of last year, the Government of Mark Rutte, a coalition of liberal and conservative parties, asked universities to stop attracting foreign students. It was a recommendation, and now legislative changes are being proposed to meet the objective and fixing the language in which the courses must be taught is the formula chosen to achieve it. "Right now the law says that, by default, the teaching language is Dutch, but there are many holes and everyone takes advantage of them," argues the minister.
Currently, around 50% of the degrees are taught in English, as are 75% of the master's degrees. What the Government proposes is to limit to 30% the number of credits that can be obtained in a foreign language per course, a formula with which it is expected to favor national students and, at the same time, encourage those from abroad to learn the language in order to stay in the country when they finish their training, something that currently does not happen.
The government's plans have not pleased many universities. The Eindhoven University of Technology, which teaches all bachelor's and master's degrees in English, warns that it already has problems finding Dutch-speaking professors in certain specialties and believes that the reform will lower the quality of teaching and attract talent.
The University of Groningen, for its part, says it is not blind to the challenges posed by the internationalization of its classrooms, but declares itself "deeply concerned" about the effects of the measure. "Sharing knowledge beyond our borders and investing in international classrooms have contributed to making our university today a leading institution with deep roots in Groningen," the center argues in a statement in which it warns that the government's initiative would represent historical interference. in their educational autonomy.
