News Master Harmonisation
Harmonisation Master’s programmes: towards more choice for students
23 May 2024
The Master’s programmes Architecture, Urbanism and Building Sciences and Geomatics will be harmonised in two phases. In academic year ‘24-‘25, a renewed Q4 with more elective options within our faculty will conclude the disciplinary foundation of the first year. The year ‘25-‘26 will see the introduction of the TU wide interdisciplinary Q5, followed by the graduation phase of three quarters. In this article you can read more about the innovations.
Harmonisation: aligning the curricula
Because our Master's tracks and programmes have become increasingly divergent in structure despite their shared final attainment levels, and because the Executive Board asked to free up the fifth quarter (Q5) for more interdisciplinary elective space, we will align our curricula.
The harmonised programmes will offer students a wider range of choices within their two-year programme, both within and outside our faculty. Also, the graduation project will take a maximum of three quarters for all students. The Master’s programmes will prepare the students for today's job market that expects a broad engineer who can collaborate with professionals from different fields. Students will develop problem solving and personal skills to be able to address the urgent societal challenges in order to be the (socially) responsible engineers of tomorrow.
Implementation in two phases
The harmonisation will be implemented in two phases. The first year focuses only on MSc2 and will start in February 2025. The renewal of the second year (MSc3 & MSc4) will follow in September 2025.
More collaboration
The focus of the harmonised Master’s programmes is to offer a strong disciplinary basis in the first year and to provide more options for collaboration between the different domains (Architecture, Urbanism, Landscape Architecture, Building Technology, Management in the Built Environment and Geomatics) in Q4. Moreover, the harmonised programme enables collaboration with other TU Delft faculties or with social and private partners during inter- and transdisciplinary electives in Q5. Finally, the harmonisation aims to reduce the workload for students during their graduation project.
Master Coordinators AUBS and Programme Director Geomatics
Disciplinary foundation in year 1
Concretely the harmonised programmes look as follows. The first Master’s year lays a disciplinary foundation of three quarters within a specific master track or programme, with core courses on theory and methods, and research and/or design studios. The year will end with a choice of faculty-wide electives in Q4 in which students are challenged to work together with students from their own or other tracks and programmes on overarching themes. These collaborative electives are within our discipline of Architecture and the Built Environment (‘intradisciplinary’).
Inter- and transdisciplinary electives and renewed graduation in year 2
From September 2025, the second Master’s year starts with a quarter (Q5) aimed at the world outside the faculty, with electives in collaboration with other faculties (interdisciplinary) or with public or private partners from society (transdisciplinary). During the last three quarters, the students will work on their graduation project within their specific track or programme, with four instead of five assessment moments (‘peilingen’), of which two instead of three are attended by an external examiner. Naturally, graduation requirements will be adjusted accordingly.
Project team
To work on this project a core team has been established under the lead of the Director of Education MaartenJan Hoekstra, including the Master Coordinators of the AUBS tracks, the Programme Director of Geomatics Bastiaan van Loenen and the Education Coordinator of our Master’s programmes José Visser. The team works in close consultation with the Boards of Studies and with student representatives of Stylos and the Faculty Student Council. The core team is supported by an organisation team including scheduling, education logistics, academic counselling, student communication and education management.
More information and next steps
Q4 intradisciplinary electives
The choice of Q4 intradisciplinary electives is known since the last Curriculum Decision. An overview of these electives can be found on the BK Student Portal and in the Study Guide.
Lunch meeting for teachers
On Friday 14 June, teachers in master education are invited to a faculty lunch meeting to think and talk about the plans of the renewed graduation.
New graduation programme
The final renewed graduation programme will be published as part of the new Graduation Manual 2025-2026 after the Curriculum Decision in February 2025.
Q5 inter- and transdisciplinary electives
The 26 proposals submitted for Q5 initiatives have been reviewed by the core team and the Management Team of the faculty. The final choice of Q5 inter- and transdisciplinary electives will be known after the Curriculum Decision in February 2025.