Most classes are in English when foreign people are around. I find myself talking English half the day since I study and work with a lot of international people. One cannot expect foreigners to learn Dutch up to a scientific level in short time.
I've become increasingly surprised by the lack of English at official celebrations. Thus, I sent our Rector Magnificus Ed Brinksma an e-mail about a year ago. I urged him to increase the accessibility of celebrations like “Opening Academisch Jaar” and “Dies” for non-Dutch speaking persons. Remarkable: even at the last lustre foundation day very little English was spoken, despite the presence of many foreign guests.
Ed's secretary replied me “The rector has read your e-mail.” Silently, I was hoping to see some improvement at subsequent events. Sadly, I haven't been able to detect a fair amount of English since then. I find it quite bizarre that not even the New Year happening - where ITC was present - had been made accessible for foreign visitors. Kudos to UTduurzaam: chairman Bob Peeters held an English presentation at the drink afterwards. Rector Ed showed there that he is perfectly capable of speaking English.
A true international university should make all of its events and communications accessible for non-Dutch speaking people. A whole range of options for improvement exists: English hand-outs, live subtitles, earphones, etc. Naturally, the best option would be to speak English instead of Dutch at an event. People should not be afraid of making errors when speaking English; one is never too old to learn from mistakes.
Written language like UT-Nieuws should be mainly in English. Let's have some guts and start writing articles in English! Of course, one page or so in Dutch is nice to remind us of the little country we reside in. But the current one page in English is way too little for a true international university. When we start rolling out these changes, other media like websites and folders will follow. Let's make 2010 the year we truly open the gates of our campus to people around the world!
Vic van Dijk
Student Chemical Engineering
