Dutch’s Minister of Education is planning to limit the enrolment of international students in the country to sustain the educational quality standards and lessen the burden on universities.
The Dutch government is planning to cap the number of international students to maintain educational quality standards. The minister of Education, culture, and science, Robbert Dijkgraaf is intending to propose a plan to cap the number of international students in the Netherlands in March.
According to the University of Netherlands, the workload and depriving quality of education is difficult to deal with. This issue was put forward by the chairman of UNL, Pieter Duisenberg which was further acknowledged by Robbert Dijkgraaf. Dijkgraaf will probably put forward this issue in the parliamentary meeting. However, Dijkgraaf exclaimed that admission of international students can be beneficial for the country.
UNL’s plan has multi-layered dimensions to it like limiting the number of admissions in English-language and setting a limit on the maximum number of international students per study program. Also, the emergency cap should be introduced in the system if there is increase in the number of application.
There has been a sharp rise in the number of students enrolled in Dutch universities for 2021 by 4% making the total 340,346 in 2021. In the academic year, 2021-22 the number of international students registered is 14.2 times more than in 2021. A total of 80,000 international students were added to Dutch Universities. The number of students in third-country students has also gone up to 15,110 by the end of July 2021 compared to the data for 2020.
Keeping this in view, Dijkgraaf asked universities to stop actively admitting international students to the universities.
Most of the students that fill in the application form to study in Dutch are from China, India, Turkey, Indonesia, and the United States of America.