Good morning and
welcome to Erasmus TV.
The population of EUR doesn’t reflect
the total population of Rotterdam.
The university is going to invest
€3 million to change this.
Today, we’ll talk about the project
‘Connecting our Future’
with Chief Diversity Officer
Professor Semiha Denktaş.
Welcome, Semiha.
-Thank you.
Talking about the population of EUR,
what is wrong with it?
Oh, there is absolutely nothing wrong
with the population of our university.
We have a very diverse population
of students,
but the diversity is also because of
a lot of international students.
We’re very happy that they’re here
and that we have a lot of students 
from the Rotterdam region,
but we miss out on some of our youth
in some parts of Rotterdam.
We are too White and too rich in general?
-Uh…
No, because of the diversity we are…
We have a great mixture of people.
But there are underrepresented groups,
also in our city.
We would like to create the opportunity
for all youth to join our university.
You’re talking about
underrepresented youth. 
What kind of young people are they?
For example,
children born in families with parents
who don’t have higher education.
Or also children of parents
who don’t have higher education
with a migration background.
We know that they are
underrepresented in our university.
That there are some barriers
to attend higher education.
We also talked to young people
in Rotterdam-Zuid 
about how they think
the university can help them.
Let’s take a look.
Semiha, are they the youth
you are talking about?
Yeah, I’m sure that some of them
are part of the youth we’re referring to.
When we made this video,
it was very difficult to find young people
with an opinion about the university
in the first place.
For most of them, the university
is like a castle where you go to study.
After that, you can get a job,
make good money, but that’s it.
On the other hand, here at EUR
we talk about positive societal impact.
Why haven’t we seen this on the street?
Not only the impact,
not even a familiarity.
I think I can relate to that.
If you have no one in your family
or someone that is close to you
who attended university,
you really don’t have
an idea about university.
I speak to students here at EUR
who have a background that is coming
from a low socioeconomic position,
and they tell me that
they did not even attend open days.
It was like, ‘I’ve never been in Kralingen,
let alone at university.’
There are some psychological barriers
to come to the campus and look around.
If you’re not used to that,
it can be a strange place to go to.
So we need to reach out.
We need to come off the campus
and reach out to other parts of society.
Talking about psychological barriers,
I think this is also the case
with the environment.
Underrepresented elementary school
or high school students,
the main reason
they don’t get to university
is because they don’t get
the advice to go to university.
We know from our national studies
that some pupils get a lower advice.
They can’t then attend,
for example, ‘vwo’ in Dutch.
You need a vwo diploma
to attend university.
That, of course, is a big barrier
to come to university.
That is one of the issues that
we need to talk about within society.
This is not something that
we will solve with this programme.
This is a larger societal issue
that we need to address.
But how are you going to change that
with this programme?
I think we’re going to have… 
We already have good connections
with schools in our region.
We need to connect to youth and
we need to discuss these issues.
But also, part of what
one of these students said is that
we need to figure out
what students need 
without already starting to offer
all sorts of things.
You need to talk to youth.
What do they need?
On the basis of their needs,
we need to compose smaller programmes
within the larger outreach programme.
But now we don’t have any idea yet
for the programmes, or…?
We do, we do.
Obviously, we did a lot of research
before we wrote the programme.
We spoke to a lot of young people,
but also we have good connections 
with a university in the US, UCLA.
They have been providing
these types of programmes
to underrepresented youth over there
for almost 40 years.
They won a lot of prizes.
We visited them.
One of the striking features
of that programme 
is that it is institutionalised.
It is within the framework
of the larger university.
They offer a lot of coaching
to young children.
When they enter the pipeline
towards university,
they receive continuous coaching
so that they don’t drop out.
So the aim of this programme is to…
What is the aim?
The aim is to connect to the youth.
Get them in the pipeline and make sure
that they don’t fall out of the pipeline.
That’s, I think, a huge achievement
if we can do that.
But what is the difference
between this programme
and the regular promotion of marketing
of the university?
The aim is to recruit students, not focused
primarily on underrepresented youth.
That’s why this programme can build
upon what we already offer at EUR.
We have great connections
with the city and the schools.
We have great pre-academic programmes.
But we have to also look at the needs
of these underrepresented groups 
and see how we can help out.
So you are confident that
this programme will make a difference.
Oh, I’m sure of that.
And I’m very proud of our university
and our city
that we are now
one of the first in the Netherlands
offering such a large programme
to address these issues.
But the question is:
when will we see the result?
I think we’ll…
This is not going to…
This needs more time
than just a couple of years, obviously.
But within the larger programme,
we’ll do these small interventions.
We’re going to evaluate everything,
so it’s going to be a very science-
and knowledge-driven programme.
If an intervention works, we can continue.
If it doesn’t work, you can stop
without just throwing away
the whole programme.
But we will evaluate in two years,
or in a year…?
As soon as we start with the interventions,
it’s going to be an iterative process.
You need to evaluate continuously.
We’re going to evaluate the impact,
the effect, but also the process.
That’s also important.
Last question, Semiha.
Erasmus School of Colour said
in an earlier episode of Erasmus TV
that diversity alone is not enough.
The university should also be anti-racist.
It should offer a safe space.
As Chief Diversity Officer,
how will you make EUR a safe space
for students and employees of colour?
This is also part of this programme.
We need to make sure that we,
also within EUR,
provide need-based programmes
for underrepresented students.
That is, in a way, creating
the best possible environment
where people can grow, be themselves
and have a great sense of belonging.
Because the university
belongs to all of us.
But how do we do that?
By providing need-based programmes and
being very critical about what we offer.
This is just one part
of the D&I programme.
We also have pillars in HR,
also in education and curriculum
and on an institutional level when it
comes to communication and marketing.
So, we have to approach this
in a holistic way.
You can’t solve it
just with one intervention.
Thank you very much, Semiha.
Thank you for coming.
And thank you for watching.
If you want to know more
about diversity and inclusion at EUR,
just visit our website erasmusmagazine.nl.
We’ll be back on Thursday and
I will see you next time.
