Is Wageningen University a fit? ft. Insights from Klaudia’s Journey
By Kiwi
Making the decision to move to a different city (or country) for university is quite daunting. It’s not easy to imagine what your new student life would be like if you haven’t visited long enough to get a hang of the vibe. Heck, many internationals move here without seeing the continent before doing so! You may ask yourself things such as “what is the social setting there like?” or “will I fit in?”. Don’t fret; in this blog, I will be covering some things you could use as a litmus test to know if Wageningen University is the right fit for you, even without having to visit first. Moreover, I also received a little bit of help and insight from a fellow student who has been on the same boat as you!
Talk to a current student
The university offers a service where you could have a casual online chat with a student from the university. You can choose them based on their study programme, their study level or even if they come from the same background as you are! The chat program is called Unibuddy (I am a part of this myself!) and you could ask all kinds of questions, even those that do not concern studying at the university. Think of it being insights to student (night🤩)life or more serious things, for instance, questions regarding safety living here as an international. We try to be as honest as possible and this way you can get more insight from people who actually have experienced living in Wageningen.
Check out videos on our WURTube channel and our blogs here!
Before choosing to study here, I obviously also did a bit of my own research first regarding what life will be like here. I actually have bumped into this platform myself and read some blogs written by previous students that helped me choose my first accommodation. They were honest, which I found really helpful despite missing some visuals.
However, I managed to get a better look on said missing visuals on the university’s YouTube channel (called WURTube) showing some of the most common accommodation options. Moreover, there are quite some videos just showing what life is like here neatly tucked away in a playlist titled “Student Life”. Some of the videos do show a more polished brief overview of life here, while some are focused on the more personal experiences of individual students. However, if you want to have a look at the different study programs or education-related information as well, they also have a whole separate “BSc Education” playlist and a “MSc Education” playlist.
Have a look at personal accounts from students
The student-composed team behind WUR instagram has worked on quite some posts with students from different studies and different cultural backgrounds (#CulturesofWUR). They also feature individuals around the university who are not studying (#Humansof WUR – à la Humans of New York).
I had the opportunity to interview a fellow student. She was initially quite hesitant about becoming a student at the university, but found assurance in these posts, specifically the ones under the #CulturesofWUR category. She herself went on to feature in one of these posts!
Meet Klaudia
Klaudia is a first year MSc Sustainable Business and Innovation student from Poland who grew up in Dublin for most of her life. Being quite an international student for most of her life, fitting in in a new place is a topic she deems “quite close to home”. Today she shares her journey from Dublin to Wageningen and how she overcame her initial hesitation.
She admits that Wageningen University was not initially under her radar. Rather, it was mentioned to her by “ this random woman on (a) very random trip.“ It piqued her interest and she chose to do a bit of research on her own.
“I looked up the Instagram and social media, and I really enjoyed all the cultures of Wageningen and stuff that was happening. It just felt very expressive of the student body that was there.“
Atmosphere on campus and in Wageningen
The inclusive atmosphere portrayed on our university’s Instagram page played quite a role in Klaudia’s decision to apply! She did have a few initial concerns about the potential barrier between Dutch and International students.
“I was reading some online discourse… and a lot of people were warning incoming international students about not feeling very welcomed by local students, and that there’s a big discrepancy between the Dutch friend group, and then like, here you are with your international friends.”
However, she found this to be a generalisation and found friends in Dutch students who made her feel welcomed here, despite the stereotypes. “People have an image of what the typical student looks like, but very rarely does anyone fit that 100%,” Klaudia said. She also expressed that she did have to adjust to the quiet Wageningen life, coming from such a big city.
“After moving away from a big city like Dublin, which has over 1,000,000 people… I actually kind of learned to appreciate the small town sense of Wageningen. I feel safe cycling, a lot of my friends and I feel safe as women going on walks kind of later in the evening. That’s not something I’m taking for granted.”
Thoughts on the university as an insititution
Klaudia also mentions that the approachable and non-hierarchical nature of the university also helped her feel welcomed here. “In my old university, it was all very hierarchical and you could send an email and it would never be replied to or would kind of be brushed over. So I think there’s a kind of nice flatness to the hierarchy here,” she recalls, to what she also highlights that the education team seems to be quite proactive in engaging with students.
“I think our study advisers, at least, or the programme committee are trying to listen to our needs. I’m not the only person that’s advocating for more critical lenses, talking about alternative economic systems… And I think we’re getting through to them, which is nice.”
Her final note on Wageningen University is, as she puts it,
“If there was one thing that I could say I learned from my masters this year, it’s that you need to acknowledge this intersectionality, and there are people working really hard at this university to make sure that students and even other members of the Wageningen community have access to that.”
So, if you’re an international student wondering about studying at Wageningen University, Klaudia’s experience offers some food for thought. Thank you, Klaudia, for speaking with me and sharing your point of view with us all!
Warm regards,
Kiwi