• Education

On topics off-campus

There’s more than enough news about TU/e to report every day. But the bits of news (or what’s supposed to pass as newsworthy at times) gathered by our colleagues elsewhere are there for the taking as well. Cursor weekly chooses from this wide variety of news items.

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Insulation in Twente

The newer buildings on the campus at Twente have proved to be so well insulated that their users are getting little or no signal on their cellphones. “People in Meander had to search for a spot where they could make a call,” reported colleagues at U-Today.

A three-year pilot to improve the building’s ‘indoor connectivity’, for which a new system has just been installed, is already bearing fruit. Keen to make a virtue out of a necessity, the responsible ICT department plans to start experimenting with 5G. “Anyone with an interesting case is welcome to contact us.”

Abuse

Sleep deprivation, marital problems, stress. These are just a few of the problems suffered by academics – especially those combining research with teaching commitments – who are experiencing increasing performance pressure. Protest movement WOinActie has received more than seven hundred reports of long-term overtime being done at Dutch universities and last week took the matter to the Health & Safety Inspectorate.

“We academics have such a strong work ethic that we are harming ourselves,” stated the Utrecht professor Ingrid Robeyns, one of the faces of the campaign group. “The government is abusing our devotion to our work. Politicians are able to get away with this only because we are extremely loyal employees.”

In recent years a fair number of words have been devoted to the increasing work pressure at universities, some of it descriptive or reflective, some of it critical. But sometimes a picture paints a thousand words, as Niels Bongers proves with the cartoon below, which he drew for Utrecht’s online magazine DUB.

'Who is this woman who brings in the pizzas every evening?' Cartoon | Niels Bongers for DUB
No more party animals

Animals will no longer be adding to the festivities at parties thrown by Vindicat. The Groningen student social association shared this information with the local council this past week following the publication of its activities on city blog Sikkom, which triggered questions to the council by the local branch of the national political party supporting animal rights, the Partij voor de Dieren. As recently as 2015 a dancer opened Vindicat’s lustrum year festivities by performing with a snake wrapped around her neck, and tiger cubs are rumored to have featured at an previous event, reported UKrant, the news medium for academic Groningen, outlining the situation. 

Floris Hamann, speaking in his capacity as Vindicat’s Senatus Rector, referred to a change in the association’s culture, something the association is working to achieve after having been portrayed in a poor light by the media on various occasions. The use of animals at parties is, he says, one of the activities that is no longer appropriate neither in today’s society nor at Vindicat. "At future parties we’ll simply bring out an extra bouncy castle or punchbag."

Tile tyranny

'Sorry mama, I became a bad man.' 'I got murder on my mind.' These are two of the many cryptic tile aphorisms that have recently started gracing the front of various buildings on the Amsterdam Roeterseiland campus.

How the colored tiles got there or who made them, nobody knows, according to colleagues working at Folia. The only hint is given by the initials 'JW' with which they are signed, and this JW does at least have an Instagram account. But questions asked by editors at Folia through this channel have so far gone unanswered. Incidentally, UvA buildings are not the only place the mysterious tiles have popped up; they have been spotted off-campus too. 

Taboo

Two fourth-year students of Social Work in Rotterdam are keen to bring the subject of self-harm out into the open and see it discussed. According to the duo, the theme is still very much taboo. They and a couple of others explored the subject as part of their minor on Violence. 

Accepting that self-harm is happening is the main thing, say the vocational higher education students in conversation with Profielen. Vincent: "Show interest, be tolerant, and ensure that the person feels you are receptive." Rick: "It’s often motivated by something. [...] I think it is important for the person to be able to tell their story about something that they may be ashamed of. To talk, you have to feel you are being given the space to do so."

Unfortunately most of the articles we are referring to in this overview are available in Dutch only.

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