News & Agenda

Sebastian Hirjoaba, Iris Roskam and Eser Berçin are bachelor students of the interdisciplinary minor Digital Humanities and Social Analytics at VU Amsterdam. They developed a user experience survey for VR at art exhibitions under the guidance of UT researchers Shenghui Wang and Delaram Javdani Rikhtehgar. The students visited the UT campus to experience an existing VR exhibition and determine the requirements for their research. They developed a self-report survey for users' subjective experiences such as emotional engagement, perceived comfort and to which extent the user is absorbed in the VR experience. They also looked at how objective biometric data such as eye-tracking could be connected to the subjective reporting.

The UT and VU Amsterdam are exploring the opportunities of starting the joint bachelor's programme 'Industrial Engineering and Management' (IEM) at VU Amsterdam. The bachelor's programme at UT has been successful for years. IEM is a technical programme open to VWO students with maths B in their profile. The programme combines engineering with business administration and graduates are involved in designing, analysing and controlling operations and systems for production and services. In this capacity, they form the bridge between idea and practice and create value for companies and society. A clear positioning within the VU School of Business and Economics is being considered for the new programme. For study-goers, it is important to communicate that this joint programme at VU Amsterdam will lead to a degree from the UT.

The National Growth Fund awards 100 million euros to a project in the field of climate change. 3.5 million of that is available for one of the collaborations between VU Amsterdam and the UT. This is the project 'Hope in times of climate change', which investigates culture change and new forms of collaboration in climate transition, based on hope. Ernst Bohlmeijer (UT) and Jan Jorrit Hasselaar (VU Amsterdam) are the spiritual fathers of the project. The researchers received budget for the project from the first internal VU-UT call in 2022.

In February, Mechanical Engineering alumni and Creative Technology students attended the ‘OpKop’ occupational fair in Den Helder in the province of Noord Holland. With over 800 pupils visiting and a lot of interest in both programmes, it was a successful day. OpKop is a job event for all 3rd grade pupils in the province and is a partnership of schools, municipalities and the government. The aim of OpKop is to bring jobs in the northern part of the province to the pupils' attention so that they can take this into account when choosing subjects and profiles.