The UG is participating in education minister Robbert Dijkgraaf’s pilot programme for a shortened academic year.
The Dutch academic year on average lasts nine weeks longer than at similar EU universities. Shortening the year would decrease work stress among lecturers, researchers, and students. It would also afford researchers and lecturers more time for research and educational development and innovation.
Which UG programmes will be participating in the pilot programme has yet to be decided. According to UG spokesperson Elies Kouwenhoven, the UG is in talks with four interested faculties. A decision will be reached in November.
Young Academy
The pilot programme was devised in response to the report ‘A smarter academic year’ that the Young Academy (YA) submitted last year. Their conclusion at the time was that staff and students were exhausted, that there weren’t sufficient education-free periods, and too little time for research.
Co-author Han Thomas Adriaenssen, associate professor at the Faculty of Philosophy, is happy with the result. ‘We submitted the report to the previous minister of education last year, but it’s great to see that their replacement took note of it as well. I’m really happy the new minister has taken this up’, says Adriaenssen.
‘In my discussions with researchers, lecturers, and students, I’ve noticed they’re desperate for some breathing room’, says minister Dijkgraaf. ‘Right now, there’s no balance between research and educational tasks. This pilot programme is an attempt to give back some peace and quiet to research universities and universities of applied sciences.’
Decide for themselves
What the pilot programme will look like in practice remains to be seen. Each participating university gets to decide for themselves how they want to relieve work stress. The minister does want to prevent institutes scheduling the same number of classes in fewer weeks, however.
Participating universities can nominate a maximum of three programmes and/or organisational units for the pilot programme. The experiment will last two years, take place during the period between 2023 and 2026, and will be evaluated afterwards. The minister has made ten million euros available for the programme.