Next week the minor information will start. Second year students are approximately halfway through their studies. Therefore this is a good moment to start looking at the future after the BA International Studies.

Many students see themselves working at an NGO in Brussels after graduation. Alumnus Calum Thomson (26) is doing just that. In 2021 Calum started working at the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum (EaP CSF): a platform aimed at promoting European integration, facilitating reforms and democratic transformations in the six Eastern Partnership countries – Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine. Countries whose international relations are currently very much in the news. What is it like working here, which steps led him to this point and what advice does he have for current students of International Studies?

Your choice for the International Studies programme is only the beginning. There are many more choices to make during your studies which will influence your future. Below you will find an overview of the choices to make within the programme. And some tips to help you out with making the decision.

Participating in a demanding academic course during the Covid-19 pandemic was a challenging experience for everybody involved. This was certainly the case for PRINS, the International Studies consultancy course in which student teams develop solutions to research questions from organisations and companies. Students, research coaches and clients, including aQysta and Amnesty International, reflect on this year’s PRINS edition.

On September 24th, the South and Southeast Asia track of Ba International Studies hosted a panel discussion on why the world is directing its attention to the Indo-Pacific. This area, which is of major strategic international importance, is becoming the focus of economic and political policy makers around the world. Especially, the region South and Southeast Asia is becoming crucial to what will happen to the Indo-Pacific in the years to come. Whatever the developments in the Indo-Pacific, they will affect the world at large. This panel discussion aimed to inform a public consisting of specialists, practitioners, and students on the different perspectives regarding this issue from practitioners from India, the Philippines, and the Netherlands.

It is hard to meet people during these times: random chats at coffee machines, elevators or desks very rarely occur. To mend this gap a bit, we would like to introduce you to a few people behind the programme, as we do on our Instagram page (follow @ba.internationalstudies). Meet Anne van Someren (32), who is a Student affairs Officer at International Studies and Urban Studies since 2019.

A new introduction to Religious Studies, a first in International Studies.

We caught wind that Dalila Cataldi won a prize in the Seoul International Meditation Festival Art Exhibition, which is really impressive! Besides being a prize winner, Dalila is also doing a lot of other very cool things: more reasons to catch up! Read about her adventures on exchange in Japan, her Internship at an art museum, her advice to current International Studies students and the selective joint Master Degree "Global Challenges and Sustainable Developments", which she will start later this year.

During your studies, you may need to contact the Board of Examiners of the BA International Studies for different reasons, for example to request an exemption or to get an approval for your internship. So far this information was scattered in different places on the website of Leiden University and sometimes not so easy to find.

Alumna Marte Luesink took both a bachelor’s in International Studies and a master’s in International Politics at Leiden University. Very quickly after graduating she was offered a job as researcher at the Leiden Institute of Political Science.