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Dutch classes at UvA: “Employees feel hot breath new law down their necks”
The Dutchification of universities is increasing the pressure on international staff to master Dutch. And that is working anything but motivating, according to a visit to the Dutch class. “International staff are worried about their place at the university.”
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Marja Clement, Dutch teacher, has already displayed the nameplates of the participants in the basement of the P.C. Hoofthuis. It is a rainy Friday afternoon and most of the participants for the Dutch class taking place there between 3pm and 6pm are late. Clement starts while the participants are still trickling in one by one, soaking wet.
The German Sarah Marschlich, university lecturer in communication sciences and fully dressed in rain gear including a south wester, is also late. She apologises in Dutch. “No problem” says Clement. And to Folia: “Some are still lecturing until 3pm and have to rush to get here.”
The shift in language policy at universities from English to Dutch has everything to do with the Internationalisation in Balance Act, which then education minister Robbert Dijkgraaf sent to parliament at the end of May. That law was supposed to be an answer to the demand for “steering instruments” of universities to be able to limit the intake of foreign students where necessary.
The law also introduced the Toets Anderstalig Onderwijs (TAO), an efficiency test for all foreign-language bachelor’s programmes. Exactly how that test will work is still unclear. What is certain, is that with more Dutch education the demand for staff that can teach in Dutch will increase. For now, the WIB still has to go to the Lower House and through the Senate, and will not go into effect until January 2025 at the earliest.
Learning Dutch is an additional task for the international employee at the university, especially since in recent years pressure has been mounting from the government to make Dutch the language of instruction at the university again. This may jeopardise the positions of international staff who cannot teach in Dutch. So there is cautious laughter as Clement introduces the lesson’s programme: “Besides irregular verbs and grammar, today we are going to exchange opinions and experiences about pain and have a cosy chat about stress.”
Integrate
Still, the atmosphere is relaxed in the Dutch class, where a total of six UvA staff and three students are present, from North Macedonia, England, India, Turkey, Hungary and Germany, among others. By the end of the course, the participants must be at B1 level, which stands for knowing “simple Dutch”.
For Marschlich, learning Dutch is something she does primarily for herself, to integrate. “I love learning languages and I think the Dutch language is great, very cute. As a German, it is also not extremely difficult and that motivates too.”
Since 2022, she has been working at the UvA and taking language courses at the Institute for Dutch Language Teaching and Advice (INTT). Two six-week courses a year, which she can pay for exactly from her personal development budget. Marschlich: “That is definitely a challenge in addition to a full-time job. I wouldn’t be able to do that all year, but twice a year for six weeks is doable.”
This is her third course and by now she manages to hold small conversations with colleagues, friends and her Dutch neighbours. She also gets the gist of the news. “I really enjoy that. And given the developments in politics, learning Dutch is certainly not a bad idea either.”
Marschlich also saw unrest about the Internationalisation Act increase among international staff at the UvA in recent months. “Researchers who can also teach in Dutch really do have a plus under the current policy,” Marschlich observes. “As a result, international staff are worried about their place at the university.”
Demotivating
Does the new policy also motivate international staff to start learning Dutch? Not really yet, it seems. INTT did see the number of UvA employees increase by thirty per cent in recent months, but the absolute numbers are still small: of the nearly two thousand international employees according to the UvA Factbook, at most two hundred are in Dutch classes.
The situation may be different for German-speaking staff, as learning Dutch is generally easier for them. The summer course, which takes German speakers from zero to state exam B2 level in five weeks is normally barely full. This summer, the course had to be organised twice. According to Esther Scheeren, INTT’s business director, this was because the course participants “felt the hot breath of the WIB down their necks”.
Teaching
Still, Marschlich sees very few colleagues deciding to start learning Dutch at this point. “Even if you manage to find the time to arrive at a nice word of Dutch, teaching is still of a totally different order. That is so far away that most don’t even start.”
Clement agrees. “When the participants complete this course they will be at Dutch proficiency level B1. But to be able to teach, you really need C1 level, then you are still a few years away.”
And sometimes much longer. Natasha Stamenkovikj, a European law teacher from northern Macedonia, wonders if she will ever be able to teach in Dutch. “Macedonian is a Slavic language like Russian, a totally different language from Dutch,” Stamenkovikj explains. “I don’t speak German either. So for me it is super difficult to master Dutch.”
Stamenkovikj came to the Netherlands back in 2014 for her PhD at Tilburg University. When she stayed back in northern Macedonia during the covid lockdown, she received two years of private Dutch lessons from a Macedonian professor because she knew she wanted to return to the Netherlands. But she still does not speak fluent Dutch.
In her field of European Studies, staff who can teach Dutch are in demand because most of the staff are international. Whether Stamenkovikj will ever succeed in teaching in Dutch, she does not know. “I would like to, but for the time being it is another level. Besides, there is so much terminology in European law that it would almost require special training in “legal Dutch” to teach the subject properly.”
Meanwhile, the trainees are having conversations about when you would or would not take a painkiller and who has a higher pain threshold, men or women? Then it’s break time and they go outside to get some air. By now it has stopped raining. Conversations turn to the upcoming weekend. In English.
