Background
University Council worries about PhD students? uncertain position
The Executive Board wants to offer positions to fifty PhD students - doctoral candidates - at the university but the University Council, worried about the legal position of these new doctoral candidates, has its doubts about the plan.
Thursday 12 September 2013

The Council has stressed that the PhD students should not replace research assistants. The Board plans to appoint the first new-style doctoral candidates in 2014 although the Council thinks that there is too much uncertainty for a plan that is to be introduced so quickly.

These students are not to be employed by the university and consequently will not receive any wages, an impossible arrangement under the current legislation. But the Minister of Education, Jet Bussemaker, wants to experiment with the position of doctoral candidates and Leiden is taking part, despite the fact that the Minister still has to formulate the legal framework for the experiment. It is therefore still not clear how much free play the university will have to make its own arrangements.

For now, the Board is putting its own plan into operation. In practice, doctoral candidates should not notice many changes to their status. “The only difference is that they are not employees but students”, says Vice Rector Magnificus Simone Buitendijk during last week’s meeting of the University Council.

In a letter, the Board told the Council that the fifty students will be given fixed work stations rather than hot desks. “And if we can’t manage that, it will probably mean that we won’t accept so many.”

There are no underlying financial motives to the experiment and the Board would like emphasize that the PhD students will not replace research assistants: the Board wants gifted students who would not otherwise have the chance to get a doctorate to have a place at the university.

The university is also focusing on doctoral candidates from abroad: “They don’t expect to have the status of an employee because that’s not usual back home.”

Nevertheless, the council would like to how a student should decide between becoming a research assistant and a PhD student as the current criteria are not clear.

Moreover, the Council is of the opinion that equality on the work floor is difficult to achieve. Because of their student status, the new “promotie” students will not be able to accrue pension rights and will need to be insured by other means.

In addition, students are not really allowed to teach, and it is doubtful whether the “promotie” students will be allowed to do so. As yet, it is uncertain whether they may – or even must – obtain basic teaching qualifications.