Graduation & You

Language barrier occurs when non-Dutch speaking students enter the Dutch construction industry, where the main language often is still Dutch.

To be honest you cannot do much about it. However, you can visit the website of the CME-dispuut and have a look into the study association's sponsors. Sponsors of the CME dispuut are open to CME students to provide them with graduation projects and multiple working opportunities. You can get in contact with the commissioner of external affairs of the CME dispuut who can better help you to get in contact with companies which are compatible with your field of research. The CME Dispuut already has well-established contacts with many companies. Also, check with your supervisors; they can make a suggestion or refer you to an employee in a company.

You can also go to the repository. In most thesis documents, you can find the company that students have worked with before.

Through the GoGradLinkedIn-page and the CME-Dispuut LinkedIn-page  you can get in touch with alumni to explore the possibilities within the sector for non-Dutch speaking students.

We suggest that you also have a look at the video under the cluster Graduation & Company, where Vikas explains ways to reach out to companies.

Throughout your master’s program you have worked in groups for assignments and studied in lecture halls full of students learning and following the same things at the same pace. However now, you are working on your own during graduation process. Whether it is time management, planning the meetings or writing the report, you can do it at your own pace. This sometimes can be demotivating as there is not much of driving force.

If you are feeling lost, the academic counsellors might be able to help you. You can reach out to them via CEG academic counsellor.

To help you understand the Dutch culture, here are two videos you can watch on YouTube.

1. A very easy-going video, interviewing foreigners from various countries to get distinct perspectives on Dutch culture. This video discusses some stereotypes such as directness, openness and bluntness, and how do the foreigners feel about it.
2. Some students might also feel demotivated by corrections on their work, but this is part of the Dutch culture. Watch this video for more insight on the critical feedbacks.

One of the most common suggestions that we got from students was to start writing your thesis document on day 1. This is definitely a good way to reduce the load of writing entire sections ahead of your milestone meetings. Try to write on a regular basis, such as a couple of pages every week. 

If you are struggling to determine the approach of your thesis research, then we suggest you to look back at the material of the mandatory course on scientific methodology.

There are many books written and research done on how to write your thesis. With a simple google search, you may find some of them.

You can also contact the Writing Centre of TU Delft. The writing centre assists students with writing thesis and other academic documents.

There is also a course called Technical Writing provided by TU Delft, where you will learn the basics of writing a report. This course can be very helpful as students could improve the structure of their reports to make them more clear and understandable to the reader. This course actually does not require a lot of study hours and can be followed either during your thesis or even before your thesis.