Today we had the chance to tour Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and visit KLM, a Dutch airline company!
This morning we took a few trams to arrive at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, where we were led around campus by two tour guides. The first stop on our tour was a well-being pop-up center in one of the main university buildings. The center is anonymous and open 24/7 for students to use when they have a problem or just need to talk to someone. This center further reinforced the emphasis on quality of life that the Netherlands has when compared to the US. Additionally, the cost of tuition is only 5,000 euros and 15,000 euros for international students, which is incredibly more inexpensive when compared to schools in the US. The decrease in cost presumably gives students more freedom while in college because they may not have to work as much, if at all, to pay for their tuition. Therefore, students can spend more time on their studies rather than worrying about how they are going to afford another semester.
Our next stop for the day was a behind-the-scenes tour of KLM. We started with a brief presentation from two members of the KLM team: Paul Chün and Donald Van Tongeren. They shared with us an overview of the processes and sustainable values of KLM before Donald took us on a tour of an aircraft hangar. At the hangar, we got to get up close to a large airplane and go inside the cabin to witness current renovations to the seats. Donald explained that each of the planes has a limitless lifespan so long as they are consistently updated and inspected at the hangars (which made me think of the Ship of Theseus paradox). He further explained how the airplane updates KLM performs are at the request of upper management, yet upper management gets frustrated when not all of the planes are uniformly updated. However, that expectation is unrealistic since KLM cannot pull all of its airplanes out of commission and update them promptly. When KLM is disposing of faulty parts, they make an effort to reuse those materials. For example, leftover metal is used to make metal cans for soda and other products, which allows KLM to be both a distributor and supplier in the supply chain for metal materials (they distribute metal plane parts and supply other companies with scrap metal for products). After visiting the hangar, Donald took us to one of the facilities where KLM tests airplane engines. I really enjoyed learning about all of the testing monitors and the criteria necessary for a successful test run.
Our last stop of the night was a live podcast about developing sustainable cities for all. The panelists had good intentions, but their message got lost in the discussion. While they would bring up issues our society needs to address, the panelists failed to elaborate on any relevant solutions. All of the panelists were in full agreement with each other too, which prevented any sort of constructive conversations from happening.
Tomorrow we will get to visit Utrecht and Aurea Imaging!