University of Groningen - RUG
speciality: Management

I would recommend this university to any student who is aiming at working in an international environment. The balance between theoretical background knowledge and its “hands on” application in real life settings is great. In all subjects there is a theoretical and practical (usually in groups) part which really allows you to learn how to apply the theory. Furthermore in this way you are also able to work with people from all over the world. The workload is indeed very high, so you have to be ready to work for it but if you keep on track with the readings you do get satisfaction out of your work. I would highly recommend it due the hundreds of opportunities that it gives you. During coronatimes the level of the education online was still incredibely high and still allowed for enough contact with teachers and other students.

What i really like is the diversity in the course, the students and the teachers. i feel they are very competent, and guide you in the right way to learn. However, I also feel they could have done more in the time of corona. I do not have a single class in person, and their online services are not exactly perfect. Meanwhile, they overload us with messages to not commit fraud but have to cancel an exam because they don’t have the platform up to date.

I would not recommend someone coming to the University of Groningen for the course of supply chain management. The reason for this is the lack of practical application of knowledge and tools and focus on theoretical concepts. Additionally it is difficult to complete the master in a year, while maintaining good grades and it’s hard to maintain a life outside the university together with the course requirements. The master thesis requirements are extreme in relation to other universities in the Netherlands and abroad for no apparent reason. All in all, if you don’t want to follow an academic career I would not recommend it.

The university is AVERAGE to say the least:

– Many professors (especially locals) are unable to read and understand sentences that have more than 10 words (I swear guys, no way you can use complements in your writing!);

– Tests are a joke: no one cares whether you actually understood anything of what you supposedly studied, the only thing they care about is whether you learned by heart their little definition so that you can answer the little closed-questions test.

– EXCEPTIONALISM NOT WELCOME: The only thing they care about, is averageness. Don’t even try to do something a bit more original, nor to add something that you learned in another course, nor mentioning anything else but the damn catch-phrase the professor taught you. If your goal in life is to become an average person, doing average things and having average thoughts, then the RuG is really the place for you. If, however, you’d like to have an experience that is a bit more challenging from an intellectual standpoint, then you might want to consider other destinations. Oh, and if you are thinking “well, the RuG is in the top100 ranking” you might want to do a little extra research and figure out who decides who gets in the “top100” and how the points are calculated. Little hint: forget about rankings, they are just a pile of crap.

– Another amazing trick they found to steal money to former students (YES, EVEN AFTER BEING DONE WITH YOUR PROGRAM!) is the deregistration process: so imagine you finish your program, you do the little ceremony (about which, the actual diploma looks like it was designed by a kid using WordArt on Windows98..) and then you think you are done for good. Wrong. After 6 months, they will still be chasing you because they want your money, reminding you that you signed a (fraudolent) contract based on which if you graduate in January you still have to pay until August. I know you might not believe this, but it is actually true (happened to me and many other fellow students I know, with annexed threats). This happens because even after you graduated (and THEY gave you the diploma), it is YOU who have to tell them “hey, I’m done now!” otherwise it won’t count and they’ll pretend they “didn’t know”. Just remember this in case you decide to go there, otherwise you’ll end up like me paying almost 2000€ extra AFTER being done with my program.

To conclude, the city is nice and cozy for students, especially for internationals since they can find a lot of fellow international students to socialize with (dutch people are a bit cold, to use a euphemism..so you’ll probably end up with anyone but dutch people – but hey, feel free to waste your time trying to talk with some soul-less flesh with the empathic capacity of a rock if you wanna have a true dutch experience first-hand!).

Seriously dude, think about it.