{"id":180155,"date":"2025-06-23T15:05:20","date_gmt":"2025-06-23T13:05:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/?p=180155"},"modified":"2025-12-19T11:27:52","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T10:27:52","slug":"minister-bruins-permitted-to-proceed-with-law-on-international-students-and-anglicisation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/2025\/06\/23\/minister-bruins-permitted-to-proceed-with-law-on-international-students-and-anglicisation\/","title":{"rendered":"Minister Bruins permitted to proceed with law on international students and anglicisation"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the lead-up to new elections, the House of Representatives sometimes puts plans and legislative proposals on hold \u2013 but not the Internationalisation in Balance Act, the parties have agreed.<\/p>\n

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The fallen cabinet wanted to cut back on the number of foreign students in the Netherlands. For instance, by forcing universities and colleges to offer some English-taught programmes in Dutch from now on.<\/p>\n

There has been ongoing political debate regarding the influx of international students and the anglicisation of higher education. The previous minister of education (Robbert Dijkgraaf from D66) laid the groundwork for a legislative proposal: balancing internationalisation. The current minister Eppo Bruins (NSC) has taken over.<\/p>\n

Language test<\/h2>

And Bruins is thus allowed to continue, as the House of Representatives just agreed in a meeting of the education committee. The plans are not sensitive enough to be declared \u2018controversial\u2019. This means that the outgoing minister can work on it until the elections, and possibly even until the next cabinet is formed.<\/p>\n

The most contentious part of the legislative proposal has already been removed<\/a>: the language assessment for foreign-language programmes. Was the choice of their language of instruction sensible, or would it be better to teach in Dutch? However, under pressure from institutions in the region and thanks to a shift from coalition parties NSC and VVD, the language assessment is disappearing from the law.<\/p>\n\n\t

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