Rotterdam School of Management - RSM (reviews)

Erasmus university especially RSM is known as one of the best business school in Europe. IBA is a great program for anyone would like to study business. The curriculum cover broad topics in business area with a possibility to choose your specialization. Also there are a lot of opportunities to participate in exchange, internship, or minor in other faculties. I would recommend this program for anyone interested in business study.

The Master in Management at RSM is always among the top ranking programs. If you want to learn in-depth knowledge across all the business areas, this is the perfect opportunity. One of the requirements to enter is to never had studied business before. Which means that you only study with people with non-business backgrounds. This makes it great as you learn from the very beginning and all students have different backgrounds; engineering, psychology, politics, etc. In only one year, I really managed to learn quite well the different areas of business including finance, accounting, analytics, and marketing, among others. However, because it is only one year, the program is very (very) challenging and fast paced. There are many deadlines, group and individual projects, exams, and thesis. You really need to be up to date to keep up with everything that is going on. Teachers have impressing backgrounds and are always willing to help however they can. Career prospects after this program are wide and top, it opens many doors. Although it was tough, it was a great experience in which I met many people and really prepared me well for my current job.

I am currently a first-year bachelor student (International Business Administration) and until now the experience has been disappointing for me. I have classes with over 600 people which means that I don’t have any contact with professors whatsoever. This is hard for me because students are literally just a number and no one cares about your struggles and difficulties. Because of the COVID 19 situation, all of my classes have been online, however, most classes are pre-recorded, so it is basically just looking at a video of a guy talking about theories which can get very boring. The university is not making efforts to understand the hard situation we are going through. Also, most classes are mainly theoretical, which is probably less effective that having classes that talk about real-life situations. The workload is very high which is normal for university but as you only have about 10 hours of class every week, 90 %of the studying you will be working preparing for classes, reading and studying alone, which is not the right fit for me. So far, I would not recommend this university.

The only positive points are that most professors have a lot of knowledge and are interesting. And that it is an extremely international program, so you can meet people from all over the world.

The first advantage of studying at RSM is that there is a very large number of internationals, in my program approximately 70% of the student body comes from abroad. Additionally, I feel like the university really allows you to choose the method of studying that you want to pursue. For example, if you like to go to lectures, then you have them almost everyday. However, if you’re more into studying directly from the book, then no need to go to lectures.

Rotterdam itself is such an underrated city. Everyone is biking, there’s a great nightlife and the average age of the city (at least near Kralingen) is super young. However, beware, it’s super hard to find accommodation.

However, I feel that the program i’m studying (International Business Administration) has too many theoretical courses that I cannot really apply in real life. But I have good news, they are tweaking the program to allow for more real-life application.

Overall I would really recommend this university.

The courses offered are very interesting, the university is well organized and classes have a really good mix between theoretical and quantitative subjects. Courses I especially liked were Quantitative Decision Making, and Management Accounting.

Classes were professionally handled with immense support by the faculties to ensure great environment to study. All the professor that taught my classes are experts in each of their field cope with extensive resources of study materials and opportunities to discuss ans interact with the whole class

Rotterdam School of Management surprises students at the moment of the entrance to the school. Unique atmosphere, hearty welcome and international ambience is a perfect combination of school buildings. Related to management programmes, school is specialized especially in business administration. It is a part of Erasmus University and many people from different part of the world prefer this school due to high ranking and quality. After graduation, the school offers the big network to their students for a wonderful start at their career.

I studied at Erasmus University, Rotterdam School of Management (RSM) from 2010 until 2013 for my Bachelor degree. Generally said, I would recommend the university to any peers considering to go there. The university, especially the business faculty, has some great facilities. The buildings look nice and are well equipped, the cafeteria are big and offer different types of food. RSM manages to get some great professors and alumni to come and speak for the students, which comes along with the high reputation RSM maintains. As an example, one of the guest speakers during my time at Erasmus was the current CEO of Ahold, a great inspirational person to hear from. The general business curriculum with the courses included is in general a great way to start any business career and a good preparation to do a master after, either at Erasmus or any other university. Money value wise, studying at Erasmus is a great bargain, considering its reputation and all mentioned above.

There are ofcourse, as in any university, some downsides to mention. During my time and still now, there is no limit for the number of students who can join in one year. This means, during my first year, over 900 students started the business study. This is ofcourse way too much: Classes are impersonal, people are less concentrated and it is harder to follow the lecture. It has to be said that during the course of the Bachelor, lots of people quit the study meaning the classes decrease in size afterwards. However, the size of the classes is still huge compared to other universities which makes the lecture quite impersonal.

Overall I would recommend Erasmus, and in particular the business department, to everyone looking to start a business career.