Internationalization: A Struggle at Tilburg University
In the spring of 2014, Tilburg University faced its annual election season, however the outcome of this election period wouldn’t just result in newly elected boards, but an awareness that reverberated its effects into the election season of 2015.Every year, like clockwork, the university is lively and awake, and it’s not just from the rising temperatures. The entrances of buildings are humming with the words: “Mag ik je een vraag stellen?”. There’s a cotton candy machine roaring, and the clash of blue and green is inescapable. In the spring of 2014, the Tilburg School of Humanities (TSH) ran its participation procedure and in the process turned away potential candidates. These candidates were international students that due to their little command of Dutch were unable to partake in representing the student body in the Faculty Council. The Faculty Council focuses on propagating “the views and interests of students and staff in policy fields and in decision-making”. The situation raised different angles of discussion where some saw a clear chasm in the participation and integration of international students in the university. While others took a polar opposite view in which they questioned why a Dutch University in the Netherlands needed to adjust.
Every year, like clockwork, the university is lively and awake, and it’s not just from the rising temperatures
“This is a symptom of a much larger issue at Tilburg, namely that the school is only superficially international.” Josh Boissevain, one of the applicants, commented when asked to tell his opinion on his unsuccessful application to the TSH faculty council. “The council clearly isn’t set up for including international students into the process… In fact, some of the other international students and I used to joke that the school was only “international” in its brochures and marketing, but the school itself is actually quite provincial in every other aspect.” But why is it this way? Surely, the university is aware of the over 400 international students welcomed every year.
Upon further investigation to understand the transparency of information to international students about the faculty councils we looked to www.tilburguniversity.edu for an idea if a policy or document had been made available for the exemption of non-Dutch speakers to apply as candidates. As it turned out the website offered the forms including the information to apply for faculty councils in complete English. If Josh’s statement were true about this being a symptom of a much larger issue at Tilburg University, then wouldn’t the ‘sickness’ be found in the other faculties? Interestingly enough, the websites for the faculty councils differed greatly. The information on the websites was so different and messy that students wouldn’t be able to find relevant information about the councils. The information given is limited to who the members of the council are and old news about faculties. Aside from this, there was little coherency, for instance in the information on the TSH there is only information on who is on the faculty council as opposed to the information on the Tilburg School of Economics and Management (TiSEM). The information on the TiSEM website shows full English documentation of Faculty Regulations- stating nowhere that non-Dutch speakers are not allowed to run for candidacy. The website of the faculty councils don’t meet expectations of students needing to find information.
On behalf of Tilburg School of Behavioral Sciences (TSB) and candidate for Fractie Front, Lisanne Swager, shared her insight of her intermediary experience positioned between faculty council and university council. As vice president for Fractie Stimulus she told us that the university was not at the optimal level of internationalization yet because Tilburg University is a rather new university compared to other universities in the Netherlands. Becoming an international university takes a long process and the university is still in the beginning. However, Fractie Stimulus is currently an all Dutch speaking faculty, but look for minimal command of Dutch in order to become a member of the council and are looking to internationalize the council. They intended on doing so by, first of all, making all of their flyers in English because Lisanne thought it would bring more attention about the council’s work. Secondly, they want to make connections between professors and international students more prominent because she has heard concerns from students about communication with professors. Lastly, they will try to get professors to publish their papers in English since most of the professors write the abstract of a paper in English and the rest in Dutch. By doing the previous, they would expect it to help international students when completing assignments. Lisanne must be well informed about the efforts to internationalize because this subject seemed to be the center of discussion this past election period. Fractie SAM, one of the two student parties campaigning to become the university’s council, took a bold move and went ‘international’.
In order to have a clearer point of view about the University council, we interviewed Machiel Hermans, a law and public administration student and a candidate for the University Council representing Fractie Front, the other student party. As he explained in the interview, the University Council is bigger than the faculty councils. The current University Council is composed by nine students, and nine teachers. The political student parties campaign in the election, in order to get the nine spots that the University Council offers. Furthermore, Machiel explained that exchange students do not have the right to vote. Only regular bachelor and master students have the right to elect their own candidates. Tilburg University students, that are realizing their exchange in other schools, can vote, as the election is carried out by electronic devises. Besides this, he talked about how Tilburg University was friendly with international students. He said that Tilburg University was improving in this aspect, but he was conscious that there was plenty of room for improvement. For example, he divulged about a debate that took place against Fractie SAM. Upon bringing to up to Machiel’s attention that Fractie SAM started the debate in English, while Front completed the introduction in Dutch, he alleged that his opponents wanted to gain votes from international students, as one of their candidates was an international student. Additionally, Machiel talked about the flyers that the parties were distributing around the campus to gain some propaganda. He admitted that all the publications were in Dutch, but also he remembered that this was one of the things that had to change, as Tilburg University has a big community of non-Dutch speakers.
After this interview, we realized that they are plenty of things to improve, in order to qualify Tilburg University, as a friendly institution with international students. There were large inconsistencies, for example, in the elections process. The flyers were in Dutch, not in English, which demonstrates a great failure, because international students have the right to vote. In addition, the debates were performed in Dutch, so how a person that is not from Netherlands, or just cannot understand this language, can comprehend the proposals that the candidates are proposing?
“This is a symptom of a much larger issue at Tilburg, namely that the school is only superficially international”
The debate between Fractie Front and Fractie SAM that took place in the Liberal Arts and Sciences Common Room showcased their achievements and their hopes for the future as a prospective university council. Jan-Willem de Wouw represented Fractie Front and expressed his concern about the transparency of information for international students. He was bothered by the fact that there is a language barrier that causes obstacles for international students who are looking for accommodation but can’t due to the lack of English information on the websites. Jan-Willem said that he would like to avoid international students needing to live in hotels. He stressed the concept of Tilburg University priding itself in an international university and changing its name from ‘Universiteit van Tilburg’ to ‘Tilburg University’. Fractie SAM’s representative, Jeroen Wienen, brought to the attention the council formed on their initiative called VOIS (Voice of International Students). It is meant to bring both Dutch and international students to discuss about the place of international students in the university and listening to their ideas, concerns, and suggestions. Although, it is strange that on their website this section disappears once switching from the Dutch website to the English, which raises the question as to transparency and availability of information access to international students about their own associations.
All the while in the candidate list for the student party SAM, is Zhasmina Kostadinova. Zhasmina had taken a keen interest in working with the university through the perspective of an international student. She had applied for the Tilburg School of Humanities Faculty Council in the spring of 2013, but came out unsuccessful. When asked why this was she said her command of Dutch was minimal and was advised best against it. This time Zhasmina wanted to try being involved in the university’s politics once again, ultimately raising discussion of the international perspective student party SAM was taking. She spoke about the difficulties of joining a board that prefers to have their discussions in Dutch. When asked her about the translator present in the discussions Fractie SAM’s representative spoke about, she claimed that there was no official translator and she had been told if she didn’t understand something she should ask. After a while she said she grew tired of hearing a discussion being carried out while feeling out of the loop.
Despite the university’s slogan and vision, the current situation is still not quite the same as they hoped for. Zhasmina and Josh are examples to grasp that international students are still struggling to partake in the university’s decision-making process. The chairperson of Tilburg School of Humanities Faculty Council, Dr. Anja Arts, thinks of the reason that the University is not ready to be that internationalized yet. “Tilburg University is not in that stage of internationalization yet, the faculty council welcomes all international students to participate, but for now, students need to have a minimal level of passive command in Dutch.”
Although she agreed that the voice of international students should be heard just like other students, it may still be too early to change all the discussions and paperwork from Dutch to English. She continued: “Now we are in a stage of transformation, it’s undeniable that English is becoming more important and we will need to change from our mother tongue to English at some point, but we are not there yet.” For now, she suggested international students can find other ways to make sure their voice is being heard, such as by contacting the representatives in the council to express their opinions and concerns and ask the representative to raise the issue in the council meeting.
While it may be true that the university would need a few years to be as internationalized as they wished, it is left to question if they are really trying hard enough to get there, and between now and then, where should the growing population of international students stand? However, just like any other sickness or common cold, the tug-of-war of Tilburg University is experiencing between the balance of English and Dutch is a symptom or side effect that with the right prescription and advice could build up a stronger immunity and a strong foundation for the future hope of internationalization.
Dit artikel is geschreven door studenten Transmedia Journalism van Tilburg University: Agustín Gutiérrez Soto, Oğuzcan Gülçen, Nicole Yu, Berk Terzihan en Ana Da Silva Salazar.
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