Ciaran
I had always been interested in cities and transport, and after attending college in Ireland a year ago (which I wasn’t too thrilled about), I stumbled across the Urban Studies programme on Facebook actually! After attending the online open days, exploring the prospectus, and contacting the student ambassador, I was excited to have found something I could really see myself studying!
My first year, so far, has been very enjoyable! It came with surprises, though mostly good ones. There were some aspects I hadn’t expected, probably because I hadn’t put too much thought into them in the past, like linguistic diversity in urban settings for example. All in all, I expected to get well-rounded education about cities and urban topics, and I got quite that. One element that I was expecting (education in ArcGIS, a geographic software) has only been in one or two lectures this year, but I’m looking forward to the course about it next year. Further, I really enjoy the breadth of topics we deal with pertinent to cities and urban challenges. This breadth of topics we deal with may seem daunting, but there is a lot of internal cohesion, as topics explored in one course will often reappear in another from a different perspective, or a theorist will make appearances in a variety of lectures.
I particularly enjoyed Cultural Diversity in Urban Contexts, and Imagining the City. Cultural Diversity was nice because we dealt with case studies of a variety of different cities from around the world, as well as the specific and unique types of diversity that can be found in each. It felt like one of those courses that really broadens your knowledge. As for Imagining the City, I think it proposed a really interesting approach to how we perceive cities, and how this links with a lot of different philosophical and theoretical approaches. It was also a very fun class to take, with a very enthusiastic lecturer, and the reading was quite literally tailor-made to the course. Introduction to Methodology on the other hand, was somewhat more challenging for me. It was quite laden with specific terminology, and there were weekly assignments too. It was heavy, but luckily only lasted six weeks.
When it comes to teaching, I think I’d be hard pressed to find a lecturer I don’t like. I think the fact that Urban Studies is quite a new programme motivates the teaching staff to go that extra mile to make the course successful. Dr. Kefford is a course favourite, I notice. When it comes to learning, I think the fact that urban studies is quite small scale really makes for a nice community where you really get to know everyone, and everyone is veery willing to help each other out, study together, and meet outside of academic settings. The learning experience is also greatly benefitted by being in the Hague. The Hague is a decently sized city with history of destruction and rebuilding, fluctuating growth, immigration, and dozens of other urban processes. The transport is excellent, with trams all over the city, bike paths going everywhere, and even (part of) a metro line. It’s like studying finance in Switzerland or EU politics in Brussels – it’s a city that acts as a complement to the course.
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