{"id":123622,"date":"2021-02-26T13:18:53","date_gmt":"2021-02-26T12:18:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/?p=123622"},"modified":"2025-12-19T11:25:26","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T10:25:26","slug":"parliament-urges-to-reopen-higher-education","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/2021\/02\/26\/parliament-urges-to-reopen-higher-education\/","title":{"rendered":"Parliament urges to reopen higher education"},"content":{"rendered":"

You can go to the hairdresser\u2019s, but not back to class? The government announced relaxations of the corona restrictions on Tuesday, which raised some eyebrows among various political parties. Several of them submitted motions to speed up the reopening of higher education.<\/p>\n

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A full house during this IBA lecture<\/span><\/p>

\n\t\n\n<\/svg>\n<\/span>\n\tImage by:<\/span>\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAysha Gasanova<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>

From 1 March, secondary schools and secondary vocational education will be permitted to reopen partially. However, if it were up to the government, university and university of applied sciences students would continue their education remotely for the time being. They are promising to review whether higher education can reopen \u2018in a subsequent phase\u2019, and have notified institutes of higher education to prepare<\/a> for this eventuality.<\/p>\n

Arbitrary<\/h2>

Many parties took issue with this decision, which became clear during a major debate on the topic of the coronavirus crisis in the House of Representatives yesterday. Lilianne Ploumen (PvdA) believes the decisions are rather arbitrary. \u201cSo we are reopening massage parlours, but our universities and universities of applied sciences have to keep their doors firmly closed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lilian Marijnissen (SP) also called into question the easing of the restrictions to benefit the economy. \u201cWouldn\u2019t it make more sense to optimise any scope we have and let students and pupils get back to in-person education before we do anything else?\u201d<\/p>\n

Jesse Klaver (GroenLinks) emphasised that his party has no intention of \u2018throwing the doors of institutes of higher education wide open\u2019. \u201cBut the relaxation that applies to secondary education should also apply here.\u201d Gert-Jan Segers from the ChristenUnie party would mainly like to see extra attention for first-year students, \u2018who have never even seen a professor or lecturer in person\u2019.<\/p>\n

Other MPs joined the chorus and D66, SGP and Partij voor de Dieren also urged for a faster reopening of higher education.<\/p>\n

Cumulative risk<\/h2>

Lees meer<\/h2>