Head down south?
The Belgian universities fear a big influx of Dutch students. Because the Dutch government will implement a new law starting September, Dutch students will not get any allowance from the government for their study costs. Studying in Belgium will become much more attractive, because the tuition fees are a lot lower.
Education will be a lot more expensive in The Netherlands, because all allowances are turned into loans. The annual tuition fee in The Netherlands is at least 1906 euros, opposed to 619.90 euros in Belgium.
Expectations are that a lot of students will choose a cheaper university in Belgium. “The Flemish higher education is very appealing, even now. It is geographically close, the language is the same, and it is very affordable,” says Alain Verschoren, rector of the University of Antwerp in the daily De Standaard. “Even with the increase in costs in Belgium next year, it will still be almost twice as cheap.”
Our country already is well represented in the Flemish higher education: 1 out of 10 students is Dutch. The number of Dutch students in Belgium has tripled in ten years time.
