Reading the negative reactions from senior academics to the University of Twente’s decision to abolish cum laude, one can wonder why this, of all things, has brought so many of them together. Out of all the challenges that could unite the community – political pressure on higher education, gender inequality, and mental health struggles – the focus has landed on a title that is inherently unfair and applies to fewer than 5 percent of PhD graduates. Universities are already exclusive spaces, and doctoral research is an opportunity most people never have. When protecting the distinction of a few among the few sparks so much attention, it starts sounding less like a defence of excellence and more like a defence of labels.
Are we stopping the train?
There is strong evidence that cum laude has not been awarded objectively. Yet, the decision to abolish it, due to underlying unfairness, was compared to ‘stopping the trains because a few passengers have ridden without a ticket’. Cum laude doesn’t provide an essential public service as trains do. Recognising excellent work is important, of course, but cum laude is a label that very few PhD candidates receive, and which the university admits hasn’t always been granted fairly. How does the removal of such a label compare to stopping a critical societal function? What is really being lost here?
Fairness versus status
A practical concern is that removing cum laude might disadvantage those who would’ve earned it otherwise. But if this distinction carries so much weight, shouldn’t we worry more about how it’s awarded? In a recent interview, our rector admitted that ‘cum laude awards [at the university] are not evenly distributed across disciplines, supervisors, or gender’, while a dedicated research for the whole Netherlands concluded that ‘the cum laude distinction is an instrument that leads to inequalities that are unlikely meritocratic in nature’. So, should we let a biased instrument decide who receives more opportunities later on? The university’s decision shows a willingness to put fairness over status when the former cannot be guaranteed. Abolishing cum laude surely doesn’t fix the underlying inequality, but it’s at least one less way of legitimising it.
Is excellence at stake?
One of the main arguments against the decision is a decline in standards, meaning that without cum laude, the university will somehow descend into mediocrity (the quality of being not very good at something). But what evidence is there to suggest that people will stop doing their best work once cum laude disappears? If that’s indeed the case, we should ask ourselves what kind of academic culture we’ve built.
Another argument states that we are ‘erasing one of the few remaining ways to distinguish between outstanding doctoral work and research that merely meets the minimum threshold’. But are we really saying the work of more than 95 percent of PhD graduates is barely adequate? That’s a bleak view of what a doctorate title represents. Completing a PhD presents a unique journey for every candidate – one that takes years of dedication, persistence, and intellectual rigour. Exceptional work will always exist, and it should be celebrated, but that doesn’t necessarily make the rest of candidates mediocre. And when we talk about merit, we can’t ignore that not everyone starts from the same place. Supervision, funding, networks, personal misfortunes, and even the kind of project you inherit, these all shape what becomes possible. When excellence is defined without considering those differences, it stops being about merit and starts becoming about individual privileges.
At the end of the day, research should be motivated by passion, curiosity, and the possibility to generate a positive impact. None of this is to say that recognition shouldn’t exist. Outstanding work will continue to be recognised in many forms, including publications, collaborations, and the respect of our peers, as well as more formal awards for papers, posters, and presentations.
Excellence without labels
Ultimately, abolishing cum laude is not meant to discourage outstanding work but to challenge the system that defines what excellence is and who gets to embody it. In any case, ‘the train has stopped’ and we should take this opportunity to reflect on what academic excellence means and what kind of culture we want to cultivate at the University of Twente. Maybe we will conclude that recognition presupposes fairness and excellence can exist without labels.
Andrea Vargas Farias
Oleksandr Mialyk
Thomas van Veelen
