I’m impressed by the professors and their passion for teaching. They understand that not every class can be interesting but they do their best in order to keep your attention and to show you why would you need exactly this kind of information to form your idea of the world around you.

The facilities at the VUB (Vrije Universiteit of Brussels) are very good, there is a gym (basic fit), track field and swimming pool on campus. As a student, you get a 50% discount in the gym. There is accommodation for a relatively cheap price on campus but you have to apply early if you want to have a chance. They clean the dorms once a week. The amount of people you share a dorm with depends on what kind of dorm you are in. It can range from 6 to 12 people. There is also a supermarket across campus. One of the things I do not like at the university is their communication, they communicate a lot of things very late or not at all and sometimes you even hear things through the media. The international community is quite big up to the point they have their own student organization. There are a lot of student organizations but most of them cater to Dutch-speaking students. A lot of people around me and I feel like there is this big divide between international students and local students, but there are so many international students that if you don’t think about it you will not notice it. The Bachelor of Social Sciences is a relatively new bachelor so the university and teachers are still changing a lot of things every year to see what works and whatnot. Mind you that it is a dual bachelor and the classes in the 3rd year will be held mainly in Ghent which is about an hour and a half from the campus in Brussel. I like that the bachelor is about 3 disciplines: political sciences, communication sciences and sociology. I didn’t have to make a choice at the beginning so I really got to find out which discipline was more my thing.

This program combines three different disciplines (Political Science, Sociology and Communication) which therefore allows you to have a well-rounded understanding of social sciences as a whole. VUB is a university in the heart of Brussels with a big international student population which allows you to explore and live fully the student life without speaking dutch. The program itself allows you to gain critical thinking in different subjects while having a well rounded-understanding and developing critical skills for the future. I would highly recommend this program if you’re looking for an international experience, a hands-on experience with social sciences and an opportunity to study in the heart of Europe.

The Vrije Universiteit Brussel is one I find good since it does not have too many students. Hence, they classrooms are of smaller sizes (unless if you study a popular bachelor like Law or Sociology), the help they offer is more personal and direct since they have the option to deepen themselves into what concerns the student’s adacemic career, and it feels as if you always bumb into people you know.____It also has lots of green on campus which is very special for a Flemish university. It is about half an hour away from the city center so it feels as if we kind of live on an island but at the same time, big European institutions that offer many lectures and such are very closeby. Brussels as a city is very diverse where different cultures intertwine. It is one of the perfect cities to not only get to know these different cultures, but to also be able to get to know locals since here it is possible to talk with your neighbours and random people because it is still not a giant city. ____The university also has a varied international student body. There are various groups that one can join in order to either get a sense of home or to get to know other people better such as the one for the African and/or Latin-Americans and diaspora. The nice part is that everyone is always welcome.____Lastly, the rector values all sorts of opinions and points of view so you find groups such as the Marxist students as well as the young N-VA (right wing ideology). Overall, you can definitely find your spot between the masses.