{"id":66589,"date":"2017-02-17T09:57:51","date_gmt":"2017-02-17T08:57:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/?p=66589\/"},"modified":"2025-12-19T11:22:38","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T10:22:38","slug":"klagen-stelen-stalken-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/2017\/02\/17\/klagen-stelen-stalken-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Complaining, stealing, stalking"},"content":{"rendered":"
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De nieuwe UB: Hier kan vanaf mei over geklaagd worden<\/span><\/p><\/figcaption><\/figure>

Complaining is hot, as the initiators of the Facebook page EUR Confessions know. Last month they celebrated their 500th<\/sup> confession, including an important revelation. And there was even more to celebrate on campus.<\/p>\n

That celebration was short-lived, however. In early January it appeared as if slowpokes would be able to reclaim their expired credits<\/strong>. Normally, course credits obtained will lapse if you take too long to graduate, but an education expert discovered a loophole in the law where that rule no longer applied. Shouts of joy from procrastinating students on the EM Facebook page, but unfortunately, within 24 hours EUR announced that it had no intention of allowing students to reclaim lapsed credits. Naturally, this was met with a chorus of boos on the same Facebook page.<\/p>\n

Fortunately, this same procrastinating target group was <\/em>treated to the revelation of who was behind the EUR Confessions <\/em>Facebook page so popular among them. Former sociology students Jan and Selma \u2013 they confessed they\u2019re in a relationship<\/strong> \u2013 revealed that they copied their idea from a confessions page in Belgium. Their revelation was published to mark the milestone of the 500th<\/sup> confession on the EM website. Shocker: the founders of the Facebook page have never been inside the Polak Building<\/strong>, the favourite complaint topic on EUR Confessions<\/em>.<\/p>\n

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One of favorite subjects of complaint: a crowded Polak building<\/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\tRonald van den Heerik<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>

All this moaning about the Polak Building and its study areas is drawing to a close, but students who enjoy being crammed together still have to wait a bit before they can do so in another building. The reopening of the University Library (featuring 900 study places) has been postponed until May: problems with the call for tenders. The Sanders Building will also be ready a little later than planned: instead of March it will be 3 April at the earliest.<\/p>\n

Something that never shows up on the confessions page are confessions from the hundreds of students who \u2018forget to pay\u2019 at the campus supermarket. Research carried out by Behavioural Economics students revealed that in the Spar supermarket, one in five students occasionally walks out with a stolen snack<\/strong> in their bag. And why isn\u2019t this on EUR Confessions<\/em>? According to the supermarket manager, his other customers on campus are the reason. \u201cThose university of applied sciences students just have a different mentality<\/strong>.\u201d I see.<\/p>\n

EUR employees have ample reason to complain, even though they prefer to do this in a study carried out by the Dutch Trade Union Confederation FNV. The study might be somewhat biased<\/strong> since FNV is in a bit of a tight spot with the universities regarding a new collective bargaining agreement (CAO). Any disastrous findings would aid the union in its negotiations. In any case, FNV calculated that six out of ten university employees have physical complaints due to work pressure<\/strong>, while almost half stated they report for work even when ill.<\/p>\n

But someone who seriously has a good reason to complain is a Public Administration lecturer who has been harassed by a stalker<\/strong> for several months now. Things have gotten so bad the university felt it necessary to place extra surveillance cameras on the floor where he works in the Mandeville Building. This hasn\u2019t been of much help yet. Even though the cameras were installed in December, the lecturer was found unconscious in January after being pushed down the stairs<\/strong>, possibly by the stalker in question. No one has been apprehended for this assault.<\/p>\n

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E\u00e9n van de camera's in het Mandevillegebouw, die de dader dus blijkbaar niet afschrikt<\/span><\/p><\/figcaption><\/figure>

A regularly recurring lamentation in this section is the acute lack of women professors, especially at Erasmus School of Economics and Rotterdam School of Management, where it\u2019s one big sausage fest. <\/em><\/strong>But no more excuses because Minister Jet Bussemaker has now made five million euro available to appoint one hundred women to the position of professor<\/strong> within the next five years. It turns out that at EUR, this initiative is already encountering difficulties in the preliminary stages. The question remains as to whether the university can quickly prepare a sufficient number of suitable female candidates within this timeframe. To be continued.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll continue with the political theme as the elections are coming up and it\u2019s time for unfeasible, populist trial balloons<\/strong>. Enter the VVD: Member of Parliament Pieter Duisenberg would like to see research into the political affiliations of universities<\/strong>. The \u2018liberal\u2019 had apparently gotten wind of the deplorable fact that universities are too leftist <\/span>biased in their political leanings. Bussemaker\u2019s subsequent response made clear what she planned to do with this proposal: \u201cI am not going to do this<\/strong>. We\u2019re not about to turn universities and universities of applied sciences into politically correct organisations.\u201d<\/p>\n

And what happened in December?<\/h2>