Tilburg University: International Business Law

Globalisation and the growth in international trade place new demands on lawyers around the world, increasingly leading them to approach the law in an integrated fashion, going beyond the traditional vision in which “the law” is found in a given national legal system. For instance, they must advise and assist clients regarding a plurality of legal systems and reconcile the legal requirements of their “home country” with those of other jurisdictions. Similarly, at different levels of public administration – international, European, national, and sub-national –, there is an increasing need for lawyers who are familiar with the international and European law concerning trans-national activities. This programme aims to prepare students to meet those demands. It gives them the specialised knowledge and understanding they need, helps them perfect their abilities, and makes them move from the more passive environment of their first degree to a more active, autonomous, and critical attitude towards law and society. The programme aims to provide students with a better knowledge and understanding of key subjects such as business law, commercial law, competition law and economic regulation. The emphasis lies on an integrated knowledge of the various fields of law and levels of jurisdiction, together with neighbouring academic disciplines, especially economics. Furthermore, it provides students with the opportunity to hone their skills in research, argumentation, communication, analysis, and teamwork. It also marks a step ahead from their first degree towards the real world, where they are expected to be aware of the broader social and economic context, to take a critical distance from the law, and to assume responsibility. Admission requirements

Each application is assessed individually by the programme coordinator and the admission committee of the Faculty.In assessing the applications, the following considerations are decisive:

• Candidates must have a university-level degree in law.
• Candidates must have a strong academic record as evidenced, among other things, by their academic results. Candidates are strongly advised to provide evidence of their standing within their class: top 20%, next 20%, average, etc.
• Candidates must evidence a good command of English (with TOEFL or IELTS results or equivalent). //Tilburg University

From University Visitors’ Centre to Leiden Visitors' Centre

Leiden University's Visitors’ Centre will expand its scope in 2008 to become the Visitors' Centre for the whole of Leiden. The Amsterdam- based Benthem Crouwel Architekten BV has created a design with an open facade and an enormous media screen spanning the front of the building. Front office The new Visitors’ Centre Leiden (VCL) is an extension of the present Visitors’ Centre of Leiden University, currently housed in the Central Station. It will become the front office of twenty Leiden town partners, and will extend a welcome to all visitors. For anyone who is not familiar with the term front office (which is coupled with back office): this is the point of contact with the client. The box office, the show-case, the desk, in other words. The VCL will be located on the ground floor of the imposing Chamber of Commerce building, Stationsweg 41, directly opposite the station. //Leiden University

Saxion Universities: Bachelor in Hotel Management

The bachelor course Hotel Management is a programme for people with entrepreneurial flair, who have good commercial insight and who are service-minded. A lot of attention is paid to professional skills and theory, and to management skills. Moreover, developing the proper attitude for this field is an important focus point.Hotel Management is one of the three degree programmes offered by the Hospitality Business School, which also offers courses in Facility Management and Tourism & Leisure Management. Balancing between hospitality and business In the Hotel Management programme you learn how to successfully lead a business in the hospitality industry as a manager or entrepreneur. You learn to translate the wishes of the guest into an appealing, customer-oriented product or service. You learn how to find the right balance between ‘how do I run my business’ and ‘how do I pamper my guests’. In short: you get to know a special industry. A profession for which you need some special characteristics like commercial insight and talent, management capacities and last but not least: ambition. The hospitality world is not a 9 to 5 world. You have to be alert when others sleep, grab chances before others see them and always be ready for people who want to feel welcomed by you.//Saxion Universities

Different types of graduate programmes at Tilburg University

Tilburg University offers 30 graduate programmes in English. Most programmes (MA and MSc) take one year to complete. Others may take 2 years full time (MPhil) or part time (MBA). Our PhD programmes take 4 years to complete. Tilburg University offers various Research Master's programmes (M.Phil degrees) for ambitious students.//Tilburg University

BaMaS is on line information on Bachelor and Master programmes in Holland

BaMaS is the on line information system on the links and connection programmes between Bachelor and Master programmes. Following a bachelor programme at a university you can continue your education in a related master programme. In case you wish to proceed to a non-related master programme, a connection programme may be required. However, after completion of a bachelor programme at a polytechnic, you can also continue your studies with a master programme at either a polytechnic or more often at a university instead. To be admitted to a university master, you may well have to complete a connection programme. In BaMaS all information on links and connection programmes is accumulated and presented. For each bachelor programme you can thus check, which master programmes you can enter without any further obligations, or for which master programmes completion of a connection programme is required. It is also possible to select a master programme and check which bachelor programmes will allow you to start with that specific master, with or without a connection programme. Apart from information on the links or connection programmes BaMaS also offers limited information on the bachelor and master programmes themselves. For extended information you are directed to information sites of the respective institutions. The informaton on programmes and their links is inserted by the institutions themselves, and is a recent as possible.

Holland: 'Insulting the queen is no crime'

The crime of lèse majesté, or insulting the monarch, should be removed from the statute books, Labour senator Peter Rehwinkel says in Volkskrant. The law, which dates from 1881 is unfair because it means it is worse to insult the queen than an ordinary person, Rehwinkel says. Judges can impose a maximum jail term of five years for lèse majesté but only two years for slander. In addition, the monarch's role as head of the government means that lèse majesté is in conflict with European law, Rehwinkel says. Last week, an Amsterdam magistrate fined a man €400 for calling queen Beatrix a whore and making sexual comments.//DutchNews.nl

Dutch consumers among most optimistic

VOORBURG – The Dutch are joined by the Finns and Swedes as the most optimistic consumers in Europe. Consumer confidence in Europe has clearly been on the rise since 2003, unlike the situation in the United States, Statistics Netherlands (CBS) reported on Monday. Finnish, Dutch and Swedish consumers were the most positive of all EU states with regard to the economy. Consumers in Hungary, Poland and Cyprus were the most pessimistic. Consumer confidence in the EU has been steadily growing since 2003. That is not the case in the US: consumer confidence in the US this year is at about the same level as in 2003.//Expatica News + ANP 2007

First treatment centre for nail biters

VENLO - Venlo will soon be home to the first treatment centre in the world for nail biters. Director Alain-Raymond van Abbe of the institute for pathological onychophagy (IPO) announced this on Wednesday. His expertise centre has developed a health aid over the past two years that is fitted to the individual and makes nail biting impossible. Basic treatment takes a few hours and individuals can expect to be entirely cured in about four weeks. The treatment has been successful for 98 percent of the first trial patients. says Van Abbe. Very few fall back into the habit. The so-called O-Centre (Onychophagy Centre) will be the first clinic in the world aimed specifically at helping nail biters and will be the first to use the specially designed health aid, according to the centre's founders. The centre starts operation this month but will not be officially open until September. There is a long waiting list of nail biters who hope to get treatment. Van Abbe says that the Netherlands has about 2 million nail biters. Recent studies show that about 15 percent of adults, 33 percent of young children and 45 percent of adolescents bite their nails. //Expatica News + ANP 2007

Schiphol opens country's first Yotel

SCHIPHOL – Starting in 2008 Schiphol's terminal D will be home to a "Yotel," an innovative new design hotel with 56 rooms. The first Yotel was recently opened at London's Gatwick Airport. The location at Schiphol will be the third in the world. It will also be the second hotel to open behind passport control and intended for transfer passengers who have a short layover but who want to rest comfortably or freshen up. The concept was specially designed for locations with limited space, like Schiphol airport. The rooms are 9 square metres in size. "Each room contains a modern foldaway bed, a table and a television screen that allows guests not only to watch tv but also use the internet or order food, for instance. Each room has a spacious and luxurious modern bathroom," says Freek Vermeulen, manager of product development for the Schiphol Group. The rates for the rooms have not yet been announced, but they will be charged by the hour. The new hotel will be located in the second floor lounge on the D pier. "In line with Yotel's worldwide expansion we are very pleased to be working with the Schiphol Group", says Yotel CEO Gerard Green. Vermeulen: "We see Yotel as a valuable addition to our services."//Expatica News + ANP 2007

Schiphol opens country's first Yotel

SCHIPHOL – Starting in 2008 Schiphol's terminal D will be home to a "Yotel," an innovative new design hotel with 56 rooms. The first Yotel was recently opened at London's Gatwick Airport. The location at Schiphol will be the third in the world. It will also be the second hotel to open behind passport control and intended for transfer passengers who have a short layover but who want to rest comfortably or freshen up. The concept was specially designed for locations with limited space, like Schiphol airport. The rooms are 9 square metres in size. "Each room contains a modern foldaway bed, a table and a television screen that allows guests not only to watch tv but also use the internet or order food, for instance. Each room has a spacious and luxurious modern bathroom," says Freek Vermeulen, manager of product development for the Schiphol Group. The rates for the rooms have not yet been announced, but they will be charged by the hour. The new hotel will be located in the second floor lounge on the D pier. "In line with Yotel's worldwide expansion we are very pleased to be working with the Schiphol Group", says Yotel CEO Gerard Green. Vermeulen: "We see Yotel as a valuable addition to our services."//Expatica News + ANP 2007

Minister Cramer tests first solar-powered mouse

Minister Cramer of the Ministry for Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment is taking part in a user trial of the world's first exclusively photovoltaic-powered (PV) computer mouse. The trial should demonstrate whether the mouse, named 'Sole Mio', can be fully charged during busy daily activities. The computer mouse was developed within the Syn-Energy programme of the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO in Dutch), in which the Universities of Twente and Utrecht, ECN and TU Delft cooperate closely. Minister Cramer’s Sole Mio is one of the first test series of 15. The minister has been asked to take part as a tester in the user trials to see whether the unit can reach its full charge during busy daily activities. For TU Delft and its partners the Sole Mio is primarily a demonstration design, which should show whether renewable energy products, with higher functionality and given an attractive form, would also encourage users to adopt modern and consistently sustainable conduct.//TUDelft

European network to encourage mobility

Together with eight other European universities, Radboud University Nijmegen (RU) has established a network to encourage the international mobility of students and teaching staff. The International Research Universities Network (IRUN) is an initiative of Kees Blom, who stepped down as Rector Magnificus of the RU in May. IRUN’s member universities are located in Glasgow, Poitiers, Barcelona, Siena, Budapest, Krakow, Münster and Duisburg. "For many students, their future lies in the international labour market," explains Willem Hooglugt of RU. "The key motivation to set up IRUN was to ensure that students can discover and position themselves in the international marketplace." With this aim in mind, the partners in IRUN will be working towards mutual recognition of degree programmes, joint PhD supervision and teacher exchanges. The idea is not to compel every student of RU to go on a foreign work placement, as Blom suggested in his leaving speech. "That is something that Blom and the university would like to see, but it’s not something you can make compulsory," explains Hooglugt. The university is considering raising the number of optional study credits from ten to twenty. And it’s not just a wish of Blom, but also of the student representative body, which has been a long-standing advocate of changes to make it easier for students to spend time abroad. //Nuffic

Good colleges should get bonus boost

Education minister Ronald Plasterk should find €150m extra and use it as bonuses for universities and colleges which do better than others. This would encourage them to improve their quality, says the education council on Tuesday. At the moment quality is not taken into consideration when setting university and college budgets. Instead, money is allotted on the basis of the number of students and graduates. Courses themselves need only attain a basic quality level. This system does not encourage higher education institutions to try harder, the education council says.//DutchNews.nl

Dutch cycle even more

AMSTERDAM – The Dutch have started cycling even more over the past few years. In 2005 the Dutch covered more than 14 billion km on bicycle in total. That is an average of 2.5 km per person per day, almost 10 percent more than in 2002. Statistics Netherlands (CBS) reports that men cycle more than women, and that young people between the ages of 12 and 18 cycle the most. They cycle more than 6 km per day on average. Turnover at bicycle shops increased by 15 percent last year compared to the year previous. Dutch production of bicycles increased to 967,000 units, almost returning to 2003 levels of over a million.//Expatica News 2007