Today we visited InHolland – Delft, a school of applied sciences. InHolland-Delft has an aeronautical engineering program in which students learn about aircraft and other mechanics of flying. Other InHolland locations exist, each having different types of engineering.
This specific school has roughly 700 students. 65% are from the Netherlands and the other 35% are international students. Only 4 students from each country are allowed at the school. Additionally, only 5-10% of students at this school are women-a statistic I found shocking. At Pitt, my class had 33% women in Swanson–which was low for the program. Within specific majors, the gender makeup is different at Swanson, but 5-10% in the overall program seemed poor to me. The professor who was speaking to us explained that the way people are socialized and taught in schools is a reason for this disparity. At a young age, boys are more exposed to mathematics and STEM. He stated that it was great there were so many women engineers in our group but I found it odd that he didn’t mention anything the school was doing to improve this statistic.
We also were shown the school’s flight simulator. It’s a Beoing 737 from 2004 that the students can configure/modify on their own. The students in charge of the flight simulator are usually second-year students under the guidance of professors. Some electronics of the plane wasn’t connected to anything though. The flight simulator has a projector in the front that shows land as if it were a real airplane. Our group quickly found out that the plane can crash (shoutout Lindsey).
The next stop in our tour was the composites lab. There, a professor explained how students work to manipulate materials for specific purposes. Sometimes that purpose is for school and other times it is for a company. Companies reach out to the school to perform research and testing. The two then can apply for funding through the government. If approved, students are able to work on assignments for the company and create designs within the company’s specifications. It’s a win-win scenario: companies get research done for a lower price and students are able to have hands-on learning. Specifically, students were working on lowering the mass of a certain object in order to send it into the sky more efficiently.
The final stop on our tour was the API lab. This was a huge flight-hanger-like building filled with student projects. Students were working on various projects relating to airplanes but they also had a section where they were working on a car. Second-year student projects lined the walls. This project saw the students creating their own miniature planes. There was also a conceptual double-decker plane. Instead of storage in the bottom of the plane, there were seats.
We also got to create and test our own planes made of foam board. Our group, the only group of girls, felt we had a lot to prove. To make our plane, we used the created templates. But we had to decide where to add the weights and counterweights. We ended up adding to washers to the nose of the plane and paper clips to each side for support. Another paper clip was added as our plane started bending one way due to a weak point. Our team also decorated the plane (which we won 9.5/10 points for). Overall, we got third place.
After our visit to InHolland, Dr. Bursic and Mr. Bursic took the group to get “freak shakes” at a nearby ice cream shop. These shakes were milkshakes topped with a mountain of whipped cream, donut, and various candy items that depended on the flavor of the shake.
We also took a canal cruise and I learned way more about Delft. I honestly didn’t realize how many canals the Netherlands had until this cruise.
Overall, I am grateful to the Bursics for buying us ice cream and taking us on the canal trip. I also learned a lot about InHolland. Specifically, I noticed the vast disparities between American colleges and Dutch colleges. The Dutch approach to learning is much more hands-on than American, which I believe I would enjoy.