Internationals who plan to do a bachelor in medicine at the UG will be limited to one of the four profiles on offer. The other three profiles are in Dutch.
Seven years ago, the medical faculty divided the roughly four hundred first-year students over four groups. Their basic training is the same, but they take additional classes that prepare them for their specialisation.
The English-language molecular medicine profile, intended for students who want to focus on science, is now gradually being replaced by the Dutch-language innovative care profile, which focuses on new developments such as remote care. The sustainable care and intramural care profiles will remain Dutch-language. Only the global health profile will still be in English.
Rearrangement
The profiles were in need of reorganisation, explains pro-dean Gerda Croiset. Science, which is now the specific focus of one profile, is important for every doctor, while digital developments such as remote care called for a separate group. And because those developments are still focused on the Dutch market, the classes are also in Dutch.
Nevertheless, the new educational strategy still lists internationalisation as one of the spearheads of the medical faculty in the coming years. The faculty’s education committee questions this ambition and wonders whether ‘this striving for internationalisation’ is supported, given the current choices made. The committee also points to another objective of the faculty, the focus on ‘local outreach’, or health problems in the region. ‘For this, we need Groningen and Frisian people’, writes the committee.
Balance
According to Croiset, it is not a matter of either/or. ‘We train doctors for the Dutch job market and we also want an international curriculum.’ The latter is going very well, with ninety new internationals every year, she thinks. ‘But we need to strike a balance.’ There are a total of 410 new bachelor students each year.