Policy university studentcouncil 2015 2016 (english version)

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Meet the new University Student Council

De University Student Council ’15-’16 gives expression to her mission within this policy. The student councils of the Vrije Universiteit (VU) are looking after the interests of the students and have legal rights to realise these interests.

The VU is changing. The recent growth of the amount of students has forced the university to revise the organisation of education and research. The additional growth in scale is a central theme: democracy, quality and personal education are under great pressure. Despite these limitations, the VU tries to fulfil and emphasise her societal character. Within this movement, the University Student Council will try to look after the interests of the students on a central level and give input to support these recent changes.

The policy ’15-’16 shows our course and vision for the following years. We shall expound our perspective on the university and would like to co-operate with the board of directors to create the best possible environment for education and research. The policy has come into existence as a result of the input of the academic community and our internal discussions.

Our policy is divided in three parts: Education & Research, Organisation & Finances and Communication. We hope you enjoy reading our policy!

The University Student Council ’15-‘16

O&O: Education & Research

Education is the most important aspect of the university for students. It motivates and inspires students and turns them into critical minded components of our society. The education at the VU should be accessible for all students throughout the year.Education should retain its quality and personal character, despite the growth of the academic community. In an ideal situation, education does not remain unchanged, but is constantly informed by recent developments in research. Because students move within an academic community, they learn to broadly develop themselves and create helpful contacts, who can help them on their way.

Education qualityThere are several criteria to assess the quality of education, but these are mostly quantitative standards and do not inspire to turn good education into excellent education. A high passing percentage, for example, does not necessarily imply good education. In the same way a low passing percentage does not necessarily imply a low quality of education. If every faculty provides qualitative good education, this will result in better quality of education at our university as a whole. Faculties should tend to the qualitative criteria for education and should be supported in this mission by our board of directors.

Along with high quality education comes high quality examining. A recent development within our university is the use of multiple choice testing. This offers the possibility to examine large groups of students and to keep the costs low at the same time. The quality of this form of examining, however, should be critically considered in further developments. Furthermore it is known that examining with well-known questions does not work: these should be changed frequently. Education committees play an important role in the evaluation of courses, because they are closely involved with education. Because of their expertise, their input is indispensable, and their role within the university should be enlarged. The education committees should receive a stronger position and their communication with other organs of participation should be improved.

Points of attention:- Emphasise the qualitative criteria in evaluating the quality of education.- The examining policy should be sharpened.- Strengthened position of the education committees.

Bilingual campusIn a time of growing international co-operation, it is important that the VU does not only present herself as an international university, but that this emphasis also shows within the education she offers. The VU provides many master programmes in the English language, which attracts international students. To profile the VU as an international university, it is of great importance to also consider this development for the bachelor programmes. Especially within the minors the VU offers, there is potential to include more English courses. English courses within the bachelor programmes will prepare students for their English master programmes and their later part in an increasingly international society. Therefore the University Student Council considers it of crucial importance that English education is qualitatively high at our campus. Teachers should master the English language, without any problems. Development towards more English education, however, should not affect our Dutch education negatively.

The (inter)national studentThe VU is internationally oriented and highly values exchange programmes. The placement of international and Dutch students within the same living facilities, and letting them mingle during classes will stimulate the integration of the international students and will improve the diverse character of the VU. It is not only of great importance that the VU seeks co-operation on an international level, but on a national level as well. Co-operation between the VU and the UvA, for example, is increasing, which allows students to choose from a greater number of courses. The University Student Council considers it wise to seek national co-operation, when budget cuts endanger the same educational programmes at different universities. If universities agree to specialise in different educational programmes, the quality of education can be retained for students on a national level.

Points of attention:- Teachers should master the English language without problems.- Information on campus should be provided in Dutch and English.- Universities should co-operate on a national level to retain quality of education.

O&F: Organisation & Finances

The Vrije Universiteit has knowledge and information about education and research at her disposal. However, it is necessary that the services are available for the right instances.

Central in the facilities which the VU offers students are the classrooms. The main building is being renovated, the Math- and Sciences building will eventually be replaced by the O2-building and the NU.VU building, and for the Medical Building plans are in development.The University Student Council wants to monitor these drastic changes and assure that they will improve the education.

It is of great importance that the supporting facilities remain of high-quality and are expanded where possible. In our discussions with the Facility Campus Organisation and UC-IT this shall be emphasised and we shall discuss all possibilities for improvement.In this day and age, stimulating innovation and investment in digital facilities is of main importance, especially now that student support is being centralised.

A couple of years ago, Smart@Work was implemented at the VU. This new way of working behind closed doors causes students and teachers to be increasingly separated. The University Student Council considers it of utmost importance that this new work environment will not damage the relation between students and teachers, despite the improvements these changes are supposed to give rise to.We also want to assure that the heavy budget cuts will mostly spare education and research. Thinking in terms of return has received negative connotations, but we would like to see this changed into a positive meaning, by decreasing the budget in places where it will hurt the university the least, instead of cutting the budget for education and research.

Housing of student organisationsStudent associations, faculty student councils and education committees all play an important role at the VU. They form a point of contact for students and seek co-operation with teachers. They know what interests students the most and create social cohesion at the university. They make the VU feel like home to students.However, more and more student associations are forced to share their activity rooms with other associations or even end up without an activity room for their members because of the renovations. We are of the opinion that student associations must possess activity rooms for their members, to properly carry out their tasks. Acknowledging and supporting the student associations will have a positive impact on the sense of belonging of the students at the VU. Also, being part of a student association can form an indispensable part of the process towards a degree.

The facilities the faculty student councils receive from the faculty boards differ largely. These differences cannot be avoided, since every faculty board decides how to facilitate the faculty student council of their faculty. However, we are of the opinion that there are certain basic facilities every faculty student council should possess: a council room, entrance passes, etc.

Points of attention:- Renovations of the VU-buildings should increase the amount of classrooms.- Stimulating innovation in digital facilities.- Maintain the relation between students and teachers within the new work environment.- Actively support student associations in retaining and receiving activity rooms for their members.- Actively support the faculty student councils in retaining and receiving essential facilities.

(De)centralisationThe VU is undergoing several centralisation processes. The decision-making and multiple tasks are moved from the faculties to central organisations at our university. In the future, this will cause the faculty student desks to disappear, which will fuse into one central student desk in the main building.

The theory behind the centralisation of several processes is the idea that this will benefit the student support. However, the University Student Council is unsure about this. The centralisation of knowledge and manpower could improve the professionalism, but could also mean a decrease in personal contact with students, which in turn could lead to deterioration of specific knowledge about courses.The current centralisation should be critically examined, according to the University Student Council. Further centralisation should only be pursued if there is substantiating prove students will benefit from it. A couple of current centralisation processes seem hopeful, but could in fact turn out to have negative consequences.

Fair distribution of financial meansThe revenue of the VU is distributed within the university by the VUSAM allocation model. This model is based on the amount of new students, the amount of credits and the amount of degrees each faculty obtains. In case there are less students for a certain educational programme, this means its budget will be cut. Logically speaking there are less resources needed for a faculty with fewer students, but every educational programme deserves at least minimal financial support. Therefore, the VU needs to look further than just at the exact amount of students, credits and degrees: the financial needs of each faculty should also be taken into consideration. The preservation of knowledge should be the central task of a university after all, not just maintaining the most profitable educational programmes.

Points of attention:- Critically monitor the consequences of centralisation processes.- A fair distribution of financial means.- Retaining minimal financial support for every educational programme.

The University Student Council has created space for several new portfolio’s, besides the points of attention in the policy. These are meant to anticipate unexpected developments throughout the year ’15-‘16.

Communication: Communicatie

As University Student Council we shall represent almost 25.000 students during the following year, each with their own view on education.

We realise that it is impossible and not much of a realistic mission to reach all of these students, as a council consisting of only nine people. Even though we will still aim to achieve this mission, we want to work on our communication with the organs on a lower organisational level instead, since they are a lot closer to the students.

The different organs within each faculty receive all sorts of information from the students, each in their own way. Therefore, as a central organ, it is important to maintain contact with these organs. This contact can be improved by stimulating the communication between these organs at each faculty. A structural consultative body consisting of the faculty student councils, the student associations and the education committees currently does not exist at every faculty. By keeping in touch with such a consultative body, a bottom-up information flow will come into being, enabling us to support the students at a central level.

The ‘bottom’ in bottom-up naturally starts with the individual student. At the beginning of this information flow towards the participation, representative organs encounter problems with student awareness and student participation. This is a well-known problem for all faculties at the university.

Besides individual actions to improve the student awareness of the participation on a lower organisational level, the University Student Council finds it of utmost importance to work on this problem together with the representative organs of the faculties.Our vision on student participation is that we should create open, accessible and personal contact, to improve our knowledge about our backing.

Points of attention:- Stimulate the creation of a consultative organ within each faculty and maintain communication with these organs.- Together with the representative organs on a lower organisational level, we want to work on improving student awareness and participation.- Actively involve organs on a lower organisational level when discussing dossiers.- Creating new ways of communication to increase the reach of the University Student Council.

We want to increase the participation of students within the university and belief we can achieve this by close co-operation with the faculty student councils, student associations and organisations, and the consultative organ of student assessors.

University Student Council ’15-‘16These students are elected as members for the current year.

Bram Kragting - ChairGovernance model, AUC, ISO, Consultation DNU, VU Education Award.

Khadicha Amarti - Committee coordinator CommunicationContact Faculty Student Councils/assesors, Diversity, UVO, Griffioen, Sports & Culture, VU Education Award.

Deniz Kimya Celik - General memberInternationalisation, Governance Model, PR, VU-UvA, FEA, Juridical Affairs, PUC, Corrugation Fund.

Desiree Baaleman - Vice-chairContact Faculty Student Councils, Contact Student Assessors, UVO, Separation VU-VUmc.

Ibtissam Benmoussa - General memberAUC, Diversity, Honours, SCHIB, Corrugation Fund, Internationalisation, PUC, PR, Register Regulation.

Dimitri Lindijer - Committee coordinator Organisation & FinancesGovernance Model, OSD, FEA, Reorientation Participation, IT, Juridical Affairs, VU-UvA, Separation VU-VUmc.

Hajar Marcouch - General memberFacility regulation, SCHIB, FEA, Corrugation fund, Juridical affairs, PR, TOP-achievement.

Juliëtte Ronteltap - Committee coordinator Education & ResearchAUC, FCO, Reorientation Participation, UBVU, Honours, ModelOER, Register Regulation, Reorganisation SO.

Laura van der Harst - TreasurerSustainability, FCO, Corrugation Fund, Juridical Affairs, OSD, Reorganisation SO, Griffioen, VU maps.

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