Five questions about the 2024 WUR Bachelor Open Day

What's new about the bachelor open day on 16 March 2024?

During the coming open day, the focus will be more on the visitors and their experience. Although we are already doing well, there are always things we can do to make our personal attention at WUR more visible during an event such as the Open Day. Hence, visitors will be welcomed at the entrance with a glass of pure fruit juice and a personal welcome for the prospective students and their parents. If needed, we help them find the location of their first activity. Their (unique) QR code is scanned at the entrance of each presentation to prevent hold-ups at the building entrance. Moreover, this enables us to know who visited which presentation. We can then use this data to provide the prospective students with targeted information that matches their interests.

The large majority of the study programmes have developed new posters and visuals in the prospective student campaign style, leading to a more uniform look that aligns better with high schoolers’ frame of reference.

Agrotechnology will deploy a Field Robot outside as a pilot. We are eager to discover whether this visibility outside will lead to a greater number of visitors for the stand inside. The robot also contributes to the atmosphere on the campus, along with two enormous green and blue balls with the text ‘Welcome Enjoy this Open Day’.Finally, there is a pilot with a ‘student room’ in Forum, with a couch, bean bags and real plants, where visitors can experience student living and inquire about finding/seeking a room in Wageningen. We think this way of offering the visitors a peek into student life will be fun.

What type of visitors ordinarily come to these open days?

Generally, the prospective students are high schoolers in the 4th, 5th and 6th year of their VWO (pre-university education, comparable to GCSE/ A-levels). These Gen-Z scholars are accustomed to receiving and rapidly processing video information. Hence, the presentations take the limited attention span of the demographic into account by focusing on the main message and adding interactive elements designed to stimulate the target group.

Is the Open Day in English or Dutch, and why was this language chosen?

The event will be mainly Dutch-spoken because it primarily targets Dutch prospective students, and most BSc programmes are in Dutch. We strive to provide clear information for our prospective students. There are other events for English-speaking visitors that are held in English. However, it will be offered if individual visitors require information in English.

When will this open day be considered successful?

When visitors (and our colleagues) see it as an enjoyable day during which prospective students see their questions answered and experience the university’s atmosphere. Naturally, we will also monitor whether the Open Day results in more enrolments. However, this sometimes requires additional activities such as “student for a day” events.

Why aren’t there more open days on the campus?

Multiple events are held on the campus twice a year for different target groups. There is, for example, an online orientation for high schoolers who have no idea what programme they wish to follow. They can view a presentation online based on their interests and ask questions. Then, there is the Bachelor Open Day on the campus, a Master Open Day and a Virtual Open Day, which is held online and in English. Furthermore, individual study programmes offer ‘student for a day’ experiences.

All these events require quite some effort in organisation and logistics from our colleagues in addition to their teaching activities. These events are costly and depend on the availability of rooms in the various buildings. Planning these events to fit in with our annual calendar and the events other universities organise is a complex puzzle, but we always make it fit. Furthermore, the events are timed to coincide with the correct moment within the process of selecting a study programme, making two events per year sufficient. In between these events, we are available on relevant study information platforms, visit schools (or have them visit us) and share information on social media.