The VWO student from Emmen who has to compete with thousands of Indian or German VWO students for a coveted place in psychology or political science at a Dutch university will fail. Not because they are less motivated or smart in Emmen or Rotterdam South. But because the talent pool in the rest of the world is so huge.
That cannot be the intention.
For that reason, many universities want to be able to set a quota for foreign students as soon as possible. That is not allowed now: selecting by nationality is prohibited. But what started as an inspiring and necessary internationalization of Dutch universities has now gotten out of hand.
Because universities have started teaching many courses in English in the past decade, which means that students from all over the world can take them. This turns out to be attractive: Dutch universities are both good and cheap, compared to those in America, for example. Anyone can enroll if they have the right diplomas and if they go through the selection process for studies with a numerus fixus, such as psychology.
The result: in 2016 there were 41,000 foreign students at Dutch universities, in 2021 already 80,000. At the bulging universities – which have grown from 170,000 to 340,000 students in twenty years – a quarter of the students are foreign.
That’s nice and welcome, if the universities can handle it, but they can’t anymore. Like Rector Magnificus Wim van de Donk (Tilburg) in NRC said: “We just want to grow in significance, not numbers.” Rector Magnificus Henk Kummeling of Utrecht University also explicitly does not want his student population to grow any further. The extra money that this cabinet has made available for universities comes after twenty years of growth without extra resources. This investment is only the beginning of a reduction in the workload for teachers and more attention for the individual student.
At the same time, Dutch students are now sometimes supplanted by foreign students. That is not possible. The English-taught programs in psychology, political science and communication are so popular that, certainly in Amsterdam and Utrecht, more than half of the selected students come from abroad.
Umbrella organization Universities of the Netherlands believes that the cabinet should quickly amend the law that makes a quota possible. They have been asking for it since 2018. Chairman Pieter Duisenberg: „There are millions of students from countries such as China and India. To meet that need, you would want to open a university every week worldwide.”
Just before the summer, Minister Dijkgraaf (OCW, D66) shelved a proposal from the previous cabinet for the necessary legislative amendment. He first wants to work out his vision for the entire higher education system. He acknowledges that the large numbers of students at the university and the large influx of foreigners cause problems.
But due to this postponement, a quota (a proposal, vote in the House of Representatives, the Senate and review by the Council of State) will take a few years. And many universities understand that this is far too long.
Foreign students are welcome and even needed for international insights and research. But Dutch education really must be able to serve all Dutch candidates.
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper of September 8, 2022