Claire van den Helder (fourth-year Cultural Anthropology student) and Orestes Kyrgiakis (second-year Cultural Anthropology student) won the Pieter de la Court Medal 2021. The Pieter de la Court Medal is an initiative for students by students and is awarded annually to students who voluntarily contribute…

How do students start asking more questions on a museum visit? Let them free an Egyptian princess from a sarcophagus! In the minor Living Education Lab, students from TU Delft, Leiden University and Erasmus University Rotterdam designed an escaperoom.

On 8 March the students of the Honours Class presented their paper proposals for the conclusion of the Honours Class on the aftermath of the European Refugee Crisis. In this course students looked at the interplay between the refugee crisis, the EU’s response to this crisis and the practical effects…

Evaluations of a most challenging year to both staff and students in terms of teaching and education support have turned out remarkably well. Although we had to switch to online education almost overnight, we pulled it off!

In the Port of Rotterdam, tiny industrial pellets leak into the environment, causing a form of pollution that’s hard to trace but highly persistent. Three students of the LDE Sustainability Honours Programme took on the challenge to identify sources of this pollution.

On February 3rd, the Institute of Security and Global Affairs in The Hague hosted an experimental workshop in collaboration with the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA). Students in the MSc International Relations and Diplomacy embraced the workshop as a good supplement to coursework and inspiration…

On 3 February the Institute of Security and Global Affairs in The Hague hosted an experimental workshop in collaboration with the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA).

Passionate, innovative lecturers are the driving force behind our education. Janine Geerling, former assistant professor of the Bio-Pharmaceutical Sciences programme, obtained her Senior Teaching Qualification (STQ) at the end of last year. ‘You have to make time for educational innovation, and not…

Descriptions of different languages help us understand what speakers of different languages share worldwide. At the same time, having descriptions of languages available can also change local education and open our eyes to cultural and linguistic diversity. But what if a language has not yet been (fully)…

Many international students are keen to work in the Netherlands after completing their studies. What are the possibilities and the obstacles? The International Student Career Event on 20 April helped students on their way.

Nova Verkerk has represented the interests of students as assessor for the past two years. Now her term has come to an end, and on 1 September she will be succeeded on the Faculty Board by Mette Kamerich.

I'm not good enough. That thought leaves too many students doubting whether a PhD program is something for them. And isn't it lonely? On 4 February, mathematics students learned from − mainly female − experts how things really work. Including application tips.

University lecturer Dario Fazzi and postdoctoral researcher Gaetano Di Tommaso set up a virtual collaboration with the United States last year thanks to a VIS grant. And it was a such a success the project will be repeated next year. Fazzi is looking forward to once again offering his students a multicultural…

The Netherlands-Flemish Institute in Cairo (NVIC) is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. Thousands of students and researchers from eight partner universities in the Netherlands and Flanders have been able to gain valuable experience in Egypt through the institute. Good reason for a celebrat…

On 6 November 2025, the Europe Hub welcomed Mr. Pierre Bachelier, Director of Student Affairs at the College of Europe, for a visit at Leiden University. Mr. Bachelier presented the College of Europe's postgraduates programs, which Leiden students can join after graduating from their masters.

On 7 and 8 November, we celebrated a special milestone during the graduation ceremony for the bachelor’s students in Law, Notarial Law, Tax Law and Criminology.

Meeting in person is crucial to higher education. It would therefore be inadvisable only to allow students to use public transport between 11:00 and 15:00. This is what the rectores magnifici of the Dutch universities say in a joint letter in ScienceGuide.

Working from your Leiden room with students from the United States: Univeristy Lecturer Dario Fazzi’ students will soon be able to take up this challenge. He receives a grant from the Faculty of Humanities and ECOLe to set up a ‘virtual exchange programme.

On 30 October 2017, the current class of students of the advanced LL.M. programme International Children’s Rights visited the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

Connecting space to society and gaining problem-solving experience: that’s the goal of LDE Space & Society, a new honours programme for bachelor’s students in Leiden, Delft and Rotterdam. What does the programme look like? And what do students hope to learn? We visited a kick-off session full of exc…

On Friday 30 November 2018 more than 70 students became acquainted with the large range of companies that Leiden Bio Science Park has to offer. In addition to the companies with eye-catching façade names along the cycling route to the faculty, like CHDR, BaseClear and Astellas, there is much more to…

From September 1 onwards, Jonatan Wirix-Speetjens is the new assessor of the Faculty of Humanities. He takes over the baton of former assessor Olivier Fajgenblat. To get to know him a bit better, he introduces himself in this video.

On Monday 24 August 2020 a small, intimate gathering of graduating students and staff took place in the Leiden University Academy Building’s Groot Auditorium. The other students participated online.

From a service stimulating intercultural contacts at work, to pet therapy against stress. An energizing table lamp reducing winter fatigue, and a website informing internet users on their rights. Thursday 24th of January, the student teams of FGGA minor Innovation, Co-Creation and Global Impact presented…

On 7 November, we marked an important milestone for our Law and Criminology bachelor's students who celebrated at their graduation ceremony.

On 23 February 2011, Hans de Iongh gave a Skype lecture for a group of 15 students of the Duke University of North Carolina, USA on the invitation of Dr Andrew Jacobson.

On Tuesday 23 August 2022 the graduation ceremony took place in Leiden University’s Academy Building. Graduates and their guests greatly enjoyed the festive ceremony.

In May and June of 2021, Bachelor 1 and 2 students of the Faculty of Archaeology joined in the excavation at Oss. After the fieldwork itself, a second post-excavations week started in Leiden where each of them participated in small groups conducting archaeological find processing and working on creative…

Leiden students are producing ‘College Tour, the podcast!’ with TV presenter Twan Huys. In next to no time, they have to find top journalists and prepare hard-hitting interviews. We take a look behind the scenes.

Five mathematics students from Leiden University and their coach stood out this summer in Bulgaria at the IMC: the International Mathematics Competition for university students. Lance, Ryan, Casper, Mads and Lars tackled tough maths problems and also made the most of the Bulgarian sunshine.

In the near future, students of the LDE Bachelor Honours Programme Sustainability will take on real-life sustainability challenges. But first, the course ‘Fundamentals of Sustainability’ provides them with an environmental mode of thinking: “It allows you to focus on what is useful in practice.”

Leiden University turned 444 this year, and we are celebrating this milestone with the residents of the two cities in which we have a presence: Leiden and The Hague. Mayor Pauline Krikke explains what 20 years of Campus The Hague means to her city.

A celebration was held in the Tabú restaurant: Mark Rutgers, Dean of the Faculty of Humanities, was presented with the first copy of LEAP, a journal where Humanities master’s students can prepare for an academic career by publishing articles themselves.

Imparting students with a critical attitude and cross-curricular skills. That is what Rawi Ramautar wants to strive for as the new programme director (OD) of the bachelor of Bio-Pharmaceutical Sciences. 'A programme director has to create a programme of which students say: I find it challenging and…

Students from eLaw completed a successful work experience programme researching contact tracing apps at Privacy Company in The Hague.

In Spring 2023, Leiden University’s Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs (FGGA) launched a new Honours Class ‘Model European Union Simulation: Policies, Negotiations and Transatlantic Experiential Learning’.

The students from the Leiden University Green Office have big ambitions and have outlined their recommendations in a new Green Paper. Like being the most sustainable university in the world by 2030. Students Janey Franssen and Job Kemperman are two of the paper’s authors. How do they want to achieve…

‘Silence in the corridor please’ are not the words you expect to hear on an open day attended by 5,000 students. From 12 studios in Leiden and The Hague, presentations are given during the Online Master’s Open Days telling students all about their future master’s programme.

Master’s student of Linguistics Marten van der Meulen helped organise the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) Miracles of Human Language, which ran from 30 March until 11 May 2015. What was it like for a student to organise an MOOC? And what did he learn from it?

The Faculty Council is the most important co-participatory body of the Faculty of Archaeology. Its members represent staff and students in meetings with the Faculty Board, and they can have a profound impact on the Faculty's policies. We speak with the council's chair, Merlijn Veltman, about the goals…

Inside-Out Prison Exchange is a course in which students and prisoners work together on research questions in the area of crime, law enforcement and major social issues. The course takes place at a unique location: within the walls of a prison.

Starting September 2022, Foteini Tsigoni is tasked by the Faculty of Archaeology to bring the different nationalities within the faculty community together. Herself an international student, she experienced culture shock wile adapting to the Dutch way of life, and is committed to help out new and current…

The Choose a Language Day was created to make high school students enthusiastic about choosing a linguistic profile and further education. Third-years were able to learn about different language studies at the Faculty of Humanities.

Do all graduates in the humanities pursue a career in education? What does support for incoming students look like in Leiden? And what makes a language study so enjoyable? These and more questions were answered during an information session organised specially for twenty deans from West Brabant.

Her love for China made her study Chinese and go on an exchange trip in her third year of studies. As an Outbound Student Coordinator at the Humanities International Office, Karin Aalderink (45) now supervises students who go abroad.

Yeast, alpacas, and antibodies. They may seem unrelated, but within the project of the Leiden iGEM students, they come together perfectly. For the international synthetic biology competition iGEM, the team is working on an innovative method to produce nanobodies—a special form of antibodies—using brewer’s…

Two Second Prizes, two First Prizes and even a Grand Grand First Prize. Five Leiden mathematics students and their team leader have performed exceptionally well during the International Mathematics Competition for University Students 2024 in Bulgaria in early August. This even made for a Dutch recor…

Last year around 2,000 international students started a master’s degree at Leiden University. To make this possible, there are various grants that these students can apply for. One such grant is the LExS: the Leiden University Excellence Scholarship Programme. Three LExS students tell us about their…

He is always positive towards his students, helps them see the bigger picture of the programme, and tries to remind them that ‘a degree is an enormous opportunity to grow in directions that genuinely interest you.’ Thomas Moerland, assistant professor at LIACS, has been nominated for Lecturer of the…