Information provision about the Code of Conduct and the institutions’ own complaints handling procedures

The updated version of the Code of Conduct for International Students of Higher Education has been in effect since October 2022, and was adopted after careful consideration. Last summer, the National Code of Conduct Commission for Higher Education (the ‘National Commission’) investigated whether the information provision about the Code of Conduct had also been updated on the websites of the education institutions. Because the petition procedure of the Code of Conduct relates to the complaints handling procedures of the education institutions, and because there were indications that those complaints handling procedures were not always easy to find, the investigation also looked into the presence and findability of the complaints handling procedures. For the investigation, the websites of all 80 education institutions included in the Code of Conduct register were examined.

The results of the investigation can be found in the ‘2023 Report on the presence of the Code of Conduct for Higher Education and the complaints handling procedures on websites’, to be found on www.internationalstudy.nl. The graphics below give a heavily summarised impression of the findings.

Please note: every graphic should be reviewed on its own, they do not necessarily add up to 100%.

On 13 of the 80 researched websites, no information at all was found about the Code of Conduct. We contacted these education institutions in October 2023 and requested that they improve their information provision in this regard. The education institutions swiftly responded to this request, and 75% of them have since added the information to their website or have indicated that they are in the process of doing so.

The report zooms in on two education institutions, due to the clear way in which they present information about the Code of Conduct and their own complaints handling procedures on their websites. The Commission cordially invites you to review both best practices, which can be found in the annex to the report. This newsletter provides a short impression of the information provision of one of these two institutions.

Windesheim