Foreigners applying to TU Delft face many problems concerning residence and work permits. Yet, the university wants to become a leading international institution.
What is the university doing to remove the obstacles to obtaining permits? Will a new International Office lead to improvements?
In 1992, as part of a decentralisation trend, TU Delft abolished the International Office, a body responsible for supporting foreign students and staff. This move was supposed to increase efficiency. However, eight years later, a recently published report by Nuffic (Netherlands Organisation for International Cooperation in Higher Education) highlights growing structural delays in permit procedures.
Certain Dutch consulates impose extra conditions, meaning applicants must submit recent extracts from population registers when, officially, as in China, they only get one in their lifetime; the IND (Immigration & Naturalisation department) complain that they have forty different contacts at the TU; and the IND is alleged to be rather inconsistent in financial issues. In short, communication and coordination between the various bodies is unsatisfactory. N. Nyqvist, the head of Personnel and Salary Administration, expresses his concern: ‘TU Delft will not reach the international top unless permit issues are perfectly dealt with.”
Nyqvist believes a central body of expertise is needed. Currently, each faculty deals with its own foreign staff members. Nyqvist is only consulted when mistakes have been made. In personnel departments, most problems arise when residence permits and work permits are simultaneously applied for. TU Delft policy favours a shorter combined work/residence procedure, which relieves foreign employees of their duty to obtain residence permits but increases department workloads and requires the university to assume financial liability for foreign staff members.
Very busy periods cause delays that can’t be reduced by TU Delft; however, sending all applications via a central university department will simplify communication with the IND and others, thus reducing complaints from all sides. Unfortunately, not all faculties and personnel departments see the need for a central body of expertise.
Having discovered that the recently re-instituted International Office will not include such a central body, Nyqvist warns that increasing workloads and governmental pressure make the eventual creation of a central body inevitable.
G. Berghuijs and G. de Graaf, of the Student Service Centre, will work in the new International Office. They, however, are less worried about the troubles outlined in the Nuffic report. Berghuijs blames contradictory policies drawn up by the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Justice. And he reserves his sympathy for only the most desperate cases, ‘only students and parents who burst into tears in my office can count on extra help; phone calls to help a single case can take many hours!
Both de Graaf and Berghuijs admit that acquiring a temporary residence permit (MVV) is cumbersome and that poor communication between various organisations causes delays. They claim the government’s restrictive immigration policies are open to different interpretations, which explains (and justifies) why some consulates have introduced extra conditions.
Berghuijs believes that many other issues are also beyond the university’s control: Many problems have been occurring for over twenty years. We can’t solve them overnight. However, we do believe some idiotic rules must be abolished; for instance, it’s absurd that foreign students, who have graduated from TU Delft and want to stay on as researchers, must return to their native countries to apply for new permits.
Berghuijs and de Graaf claim that delays in bureaucratic procedures often result from students’ mistakes or ignorance. And they question the motives of students who have not carefully considered their financial situation before applying for permits. Berghuijs: TU staff could work more efficiently if foreign students prepared for their stay here more carefully. The Nuffic website offers comprehensive information about permit procedures.
Rather reluctantly, de Graaf and Berghuijs mention some improvements that could made in their own department: the TU’s internet-site must be upgraded and the English-language site offering course descriptions must be updated. Unfortunately, there are no funds available for this at present.
Annemarie Rima, head of the MSc Office, is more diplomatic, even though her management functions don’t involve her directly with permit problems. She’s aware of the mobility obstacles, or ‘mobstacles’, but as the future director of the International Office, she predicts that improved communication will solve many of these problems. Internally, TU organisations will be located in the one office; externally, government organisations like the IND will benefitfrom having only one TU contact-person.
TU Delft’s internationalisation policies are extremely ambitious; and now that the International office has been allocated funds to create 6.5 new jobs, Rima is convinced that, with time and effort, the situation will be such that foreign staff and students will experience an arrival in Delft that is like taking a hot bath: warm and comfortable.(AB)
. . www.nuffic.nl
Foreigners applying to TU Delft face many problems concerning residence and work permits. Yet, the university wants to become a leading international institution. What is the university doing to remove the obstacles to obtaining permits? Will a new International Office lead to improvements?
In 1992, as part of a decentralisation trend, TU Delft abolished the International Office, a body responsible for supporting foreign students and staff. This move was supposed to increase efficiency. However, eight years later, a recently published report by Nuffic (Netherlands Organisation for International Cooperation in Higher Education) highlights growing structural delays in permit procedures.
Certain Dutch consulates impose extra conditions, meaning applicants must submit recent extracts from population registers when, officially, as in China, they only get one in their lifetime; the IND (Immigration & Naturalisation department) complain that they have forty different contacts at the TU; and the IND is alleged to be rather inconsistent in financial issues. In short, communication and coordination between the various bodies is unsatisfactory. N. Nyqvist, the head of Personnel and Salary Administration, expresses his concern: ‘TU Delft will not reach the international top unless permit issues are perfectly dealt with.”
Nyqvist believes a central body of expertise is needed. Currently, each faculty deals with its own foreign staff members. Nyqvist is only consulted when mistakes have been made. In personnel departments, most problems arise when residence permits and work permits are simultaneously applied for. TU Delft policy favours a shorter combined work/residence procedure, which relieves foreign employees of their duty to obtain residence permits but increases department workloads and requires the university to assume financial liability for foreign staff members.
Very busy periods cause delays that can’t be reduced by TU Delft; however, sending all applications via a central university department will simplify communication with the IND and others, thus reducing complaints from all sides. Unfortunately, not all faculties and personnel departments see the need for a central body of expertise.
Having discovered that the recently re-instituted International Office will not include such a central body, Nyqvist warns that increasing workloads and governmental pressure make the eventual creation of a central body inevitable.
G. Berghuijs and G. de Graaf, of the Student Service Centre, will work in the new International Office. They, however, are less worried about the troubles outlined in the Nuffic report. Berghuijs blames contradictory policies drawn up by the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Justice. And he reserves his sympathy for only the most desperate cases, ‘only students and parents who burst into tears in my office can count on extra help; phone calls to help a single case can take many hours!
Both de Graaf and Berghuijs admit that acquiring a temporary residence permit (MVV) is cumbersome and that poor communication between various organisations causes delays. They claim the government’s restrictive immigration policies are open to different interpretations, which explains (and justifies) why some consulates have introduced extra conditions.
Berghuijs believes that many other issues are also beyond the university’s control: Many problems have been occurring for over twenty years. We can’t solve them overnight. However, we do believe some idiotic rules must be abolished; for instance, it’s absurd that foreign students, who have graduated from TU Delft and want to stay on as researchers, must return to their native countries to apply for new permits.
Berghuijs and de Graaf claim that delays in bureaucratic procedures often result from students’ mistakes or ignorance. And they question the motives of students who have not carefully considered their financial situation before applying for permits. Berghuijs: TU staff could work more efficiently if foreign students prepared for their stay here more carefully. The Nuffic website offers comprehensive information about permit procedures.
Rather reluctantly, de Graaf and Berghuijs mention some improvements that could made in their own department: the TU’s internet-site must be upgraded and the English-language site offering course descriptions must be updated. Unfortunately, there are no funds available for this at present.
Annemarie Rima, head of the MSc Office, is more diplomatic, even though her management functions don’t involve her directly with permit problems. She’s aware of the mobility obstacles, or ‘mobstacles’, but as the future director of the International Office, she predicts that improved communication will solve many of these problems. Internally, TU organisations will be located in the one office; externally, government organisations like the IND will benefitfrom having only one TU contact-person.
TU Delft’s internationalisation policies are extremely ambitious; and now that the International office has been allocated funds to create 6.5 new jobs, Rima is convinced that, with time and effort, the situation will be such that foreign staff and students will experience an arrival in Delft that is like taking a hot bath: warm and comfortable.(AB)
. . www.nuffic.nl
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