Electrical Engineering, the program I attended, is delivered by renowned professors & researchers, with enough course projects. The courses are designed with the latest technologies in mind, based on recent research publications and developed technologies. The courses have the ability to immerse you into the latest technology realm. What makes these courses interesting, alongside their content, is the way the courses are delivered. The courses are delivered by the professors and their teaching assistants are available at your disposal, with a great desire to help you. That helps for students like me who wonder about every aspect of a topic and hence come up with tones of questions.

Location/Lifestyle
TU/e is situated in a small city. One of the drawbacks is the location, the city of Eindhoven is not the best student city and hasn’t really changed in the past 5 years given that the Netherlands is one of the best economies. Eindhoven has pretty much nothing to do, one can easily get bored after 4/5 weeks. The city is just not big enough to have a metro/tram system. Everybody uses bicycles to get around and coincidently it rains more than 150 days a year which is not the best situation. It can get really boring and dull especially if you are an expat or an international. The supermarkets lack variety even though the food quality is the best in the world.

Finances
It is pretty unfair to ask international prospective student tuition (11000 Euros) that is 5 times as much as the for national and EU citizens (~1900 Euros). The accommodation is one of the major issues here at TU. More students are intentionally registered/accepted than their capacity. Apartments are extremely expensive to rent and student houses are getting expensive by the year. If you have no experience living in a student house, it’s very likely that you will get scammed or not receive your deposit. Monthly expenditure on food and travel can go up to 300/400 Euros. Traveling around the Netherlands is fairly easy since all cities are connected via train/bus.

Study
The university sets a low bar for entrance and gives a chance to everyone to excel, unlike the UK. This is also countered by ‘filtering’ the students via the basic courses like physics and calculus. However, surprisingly enough bachelor students are planned to graduate in 3 years, which is highly impossible if you want to have a decent social life and make connections. The course division and selection is also decent and well planned. However, not much effort or time is invested in courses with passing rates lower than 20-30%. This results in smart students losing their motivation and credibility. The resources regarding my degree at least are good (Practical Labs

I think that Eindhoven University of Technology is a great university in terms of facilities and opportunities to explore which area of Electrical Engineering you like the most. Unfortunately, the lecturers aren’t always very good in the 1st year, but after that it gets better. Also, as an international student I experience a sense of isolation when instructors speak to Dutch to the students, since they assume that everyone in the group can understand it. This happens outside of lectures.

I am quite happy with my experience at the TUe so far. The education level is way higher than I expected but in a good way. It does get stressful every now and then because of the quartile system the university uses, but it is manageable. Keep in mind that this uni advertises it’s degrees as 3 years, but (in EE at least) only around 40% of students graduate in 3 years.

This university is very technical and oriented more towards theoretical knowledge and research. That being said, there is a bunch of group projects in my program like designing wireless chargers, automating baby cradles (this course is called Rock Your Baby!). The courses themselves are fun and educational, you have to pass 9/12 courses in the first year to stay in major you enrolled in. It is not as difficult as it sounds. There are lots of labs embedded in the other courses, particularly in the later senior courses that are very fun and interesting as they let you apply the knowledge you learn directly into a practical scenario. The facilities for those labs are usually top-notch. You are only getting the best.

The professors require proficient (C1 level) English to teach, so you can expect good English from them, with the occasional accent. Regardless, there is no doubt they are more than competent to do their job.

Accommodation is a problem in the whole of the Netherlands, and as such housing companies do the only obvious thing any company can do to help and that is raising their prices to astronomical levels (this is passive-aggressive sarcasm if you couldn’t tell). The university does its share to help students find accommodation in these conditions, but there is only so much it can do on its own. This is the only problem I’ve seen in studying in the Netherlands in general.

The TU/e offers a great opportunity to immerse yourself in your study and area of interest. Most courses, – especially first year and introductory ones – are well organised and are designed to help you pass, given that you put in the effort, of course.

That being said, this university is not for you if you’re both:

a) An international student
b) Coming here to enjoy a “student life”

Put simply, if you are planning to come here, make sure that your goal is to finish your study first and foremost, everything else can follow.

Since it follows the quarter system life here is very fast-paced and hectic but a very good learning experience. The courses are well designed and the professors are really good. The learning curve is steep.