Enthusiasm for council work remains low. In the previous University Council election, almost all candidates of the personnel faction entered the council anyway, as the number of candidates barely exceeded the number of seats.* There are few new candidates, while a combination of veterans and young talents is preferred. This ensures follow-up on projects, but also leaves room for fresh input.

Well-informed

University Council member Martijn Klabbers has been working in co-determination for many years alongside his job as a project manager at the department of Mathematics and Computer Science. He understands the importance of being well-informed about long-term projects, knowledge which experienced council members have accumulated over many years. 

“Institutional knowledge is indispensable for complex issues. For example, regarding the future governance of TU/e. This revolves around the eponymous working group working on the potential restructuring of the university into four departments. In this context, the council recently posed questions about the repositioning of the EPC, a matter for which knowledge of the longer history is essential.” At the same time, Klabbers believes diversity in the council is important: there must also be room for new voices and fresh perspectives from new members.

“The University Council has therefore devised a revitalization project: Revitalizing Co-determination,” Klabbers explains. “This provides, for example, structural improvements in the areas of visibility and recognition to motivate more people to participate in decision-making. But it has yet to launch.” Therefore, it did not yet have any influence on the current list of candidates.

Compensation

The reason for so little interest in becoming a council member has not been investigated. Students and staff who are considering a participation role receive compensation. Depending on the type of position, this is in the form of money or free time. Student financial compensation was recently increased. This was to encourage more students to take on such extracurricular activities and because compensation in Eindhoven lagged behind that of other universities.

Turnout for university elections is traditionally low. Each year, barely a quarter of eligible voters actually ‘show up’: voting is done digitally.

“We're struggling with these low figures,” Klabbers acknowledges. The average is 23 percent for students and 32 percent for staff. The council member sees no reason to expect higher figures in this election. Nevertheless, he hopes for a slight increase. “The higher the turnout, the stronger the council's position.” This increases support for decisions, as more students and staff have made their voices heard.

Limited visibility

Klabbers believes that the limited visibility of participation within the university community is not helping to improve these turnout figures. “The Executive Board (EB) has tried to actively encourage candidates to apply and to promote the value of participation more widely, but it is disappointing that their efforts have had no noticeable effect.”

Klabbers sees room for improvement here. “Exactly the Executive Board and the boards of departments and services, could more prominently position the role of co-determination as a learning and development path, where both students and staff learn important competencies.”

Voting

Voting for the University Council is open today and tomorrow. Everyone eligible to vote will receive an email with the link to do so.

“The upcoming elections are an opportunity to restore balance,” says Klabbers. “We urge everyone to vote. Without broad-based participation, we may miss out on perspectives and it will be difficult to increase support for decisions.”

This article was translated using AI-assisted tools and reviewed by an editor

*This sentence was updated on December 11, 2025, to make it clearer that this applies specifically to the personnel faction.