Minister makes binding study advice less strict
Minister Van Engelshoven wants to end the strict binding study advice for first-year students. They will soon only have to obtain 40 of the 60 credits.
Picture: National government
She announced this this afternoon in her speech at the opening of the new academic year in Tilburg. Many universities and colleges now apply a stricter standard, for example 50 points.
The news will hit particularly hard at Erasmus University Rotterdam. Since 2012, a standard of 60 points has applied there: under the motto 'nominal is normal', Rotterdam students must pass their propaedeutic certificate in one go or else pack their bags. There is now a line through it.
That is, if the D66 minister in the House of Representatives gets a majority behind her proposal. The plan is not included in the coalition agreement, so the coalition parties (except D66 are VVD, CDA and ChristenUnie) will make their own decisions. The new 'ceiling' will apply at the earliest next academic year.
Unnecessary tripping
Van Engelshoven wants to achieve that students no longer “stumble unnecessarily” in the first year of study, she explains. She also hopes that the 'psychological pressure' on students will decrease now that the standard is being lowered somewhat.
“With a BSA of 50 or 60 credits in the first year, you catch students at the most vulnerable moment, at the start of their studies,” says Van Engelshoven. This would especially be bothering students who are the first in their family to study and who have to get used to their “new life as a student”. She also hopes that late bloomers have a better chance in this way.
Minister of Education Van Engelshoven: 'With a BSA of 50 or 60 credits in the first year, you grab students at the most vulnerable moment, at the start of their studies'
The binding study advice is originally intended to assess in time whether a student is suitable for the study program. Universities and colleges could use it to prevent bad students from slogging for years before getting stranded.
No chance?
But according to the minister, programs now use the BSA to filter out slow students and to increase the 'efficiency' of the program. “I don't want the system to turn out like that and that's why I intervene,” she says. "Anyone who gets two thirds of their first year can never be in the wrong place or have no chance."
Two years ago, it turned out that colleges and universities were violating the law en masse with their binding study advice by also sending students away at the end of the second year. A series of judgments from the education court CBHO put an end to this.
Institutions quickly adjusted their rules, but hundreds of students had already been unjustly expelled. In principle, they were allowed to return. About XNUMX students actually did that.
Lawsuits
But universities and colleges still had plenty of room to set their own standards. This spring, Erasmus University and Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences won two more lawsuits from students who challenged the strict BSA standard of 60 points.
If it were up to Minister Van Engelshoven, that would end. In a debate with the House of Representatives, she had previously said that she was considering setting limits for binding study advice.
In the autumn, the minister will publish a letter on the accessibility of higher education. It will also further elaborate this proposal in it. She hopes that the educational institutions will get ahead of it and start adjusting their standards now.
