Successful Holland Alumni Conference: 120 alumni from 64 countries gathered

In November 2009, a successful Holland Alumni Conference was organized by Nuffic (Netherlands Organization for international cooperation in higher education). The Dutch Ministry of Education together with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs financed the conference and the travel costs of a group of talented international alumni who studied at Dutch higher education institutes. A total of 120 alumni from 64 countries were invited to visit the Netherlands for the Holland Alumni Conference held on 5 and 6 November in The Hague.

The University of Groningen alumni invited to the conference were Maclaud Mafaiti (Zimbabwe) Information Security Consultant at Trustwave; Fang Chi Hsu (Taiwan), senior specialist at AIPTEK International Inc.; Eleftheria Gerontidi (Greece), lawyer in Private Law and former advisor to the Greek Ministry of Transport and Telecommunications; and Dewi Cut (Indonesia), lecturer at Syiah Kuala University. The aim of the conference was to facilitate the worldwide exchange of knowledge between international alumni who studied in the Netherlands, to contribute to the creation of alumni networks in different areas of expertise and to strengthen the relationships between international alumni and the Dutch higher education institutions at which they studied.

The importance of a warm relationship between universities and international alumni was stressed by Sijbolt Noorda, president of the Association of Universities in the Netherlands (VSNU), in his opening speech. International alumni have careers in their home countries. This enhances the name of their alma mater, while the good international reputation of the higher education institution reflects on its alumni. ‘Your success is our success and our success is your success’, Noorda thus stated.