Neuroscience & Education
Neuroscience Campus Amsterdam - Bachelor education
Neuroscience Campus Amsterdam participates in three Bachelor programs of the Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences (FALW):
- Biologie (Biology)
- Biomedische Wetenschappen (Biomedical Sciences)
- Gezondheid & Leven (Health & Life Sciences)
Undergraduate students with a degree in either one of these Bachelors are potential candidates for the Master of Neurosciences. The minimal requirement to qualify for the MSc Neurosciences students is to have successfully participated in an introductory neuroscience course (indicated below):
- Biologie > Genen, hersenen en gedrag (1st year)
- Biomedische Wetenschappen > Neurowetenschappen 1 (2nd year)
- Gezondheid & Leven > Preklinische Neurowetenschappen (2nd year)
A specialization route has been developed for the Bachelor student with a high interest in the neurosciences. These students can participate in optional courses in the 2nd and 3rd year of their studies:
- Neurowetenschappen 2
- Neurowetenschappen 3
These courses are only open to Biology students and Biomedical Sciences students who have passed their introductory neuroscience education (see above). Health & Life Sciences students can only be admitted when they can be accommodated (max. 100 students) and after formal approval of their Examination Committee. Alternative neuroscience courses have been developed for 2nd year and 3rd year Health & Life Sciences students:
- Farmacologie en drug design
- Humane Neurofysiologie
An important part of the undergraduate curriculum is the four-month research internship at a scientific department. A limited number of these internship projects are available each year at the Neuroscience Campus Amsterdam. Potential candidates are selected after the Neurowetenschappen 2 and 3 courses on the basis of course grades and motivation.
Neuroscience Campus Amsterdam Vision on education
“Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire”
- William Butler Yeats
Neuroscience Campus Amsterdam believes university education should be about providing the conditions in which students can learn. Such conditions allow the possibility to get away from textbook knowledge per se and become curious about how this knowledge was attained.
How do you light a fire? By involving the students in what we do. In exactly that which makes us as neuroscientists enthusiastic about what we do: ask ourselves questions on how the brain works and try to tackle them. This is the reason that all Neuroscience Campus Amsterdam BSc courses have a strong research orientation.
How do you keep the fire burning? By showing students that neuroscience is an ongoing process, that there are so many exciting developments and breakthroughs in this field, and will be in the near future. By focusing on human neurobiology, making them aware of the relevance of questions raised about the human brain. By making them realize that they themselves could be, in a few years, pioneering new areas of research. Therefore, just as NCA research is brain disease oriented, so is the content of our courses.
An old Chinese proverb goes ‘Tell me, and I forget, show me and I remember’ By showing them instead of telling them, for instance by involving patients in lectures on Alzheimer’s disease, the problems that brain diseases can cause literally come to life and undergraduates become all the more aware of the challenges in the field. We also invest in doing as much practical , even with large groups of students. And this approach works. For example, during a neuroanatomical practical on pig brains, one student said: “Now I finally understand how this thing is built up, I am never able to get these 2D pictures in the textbooks”.
Yet, lighting fires is not enough, you have to burn some wood to qualify for our Master program. NCA created a Neuroscience-route through each of the life science Bachelor programs of the Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences, which secures the entrance pass to the Neuroscience Master. More in particular, the series of Neuroscience I, II and III courses guide the student from a broad overview of the field to in depth knowledge and experience of different specializations within the neurosciences.
The Neuroscience Campus Amsterdam has its own Education Board that monitors the quality of Neuroscience educational program, the individual courses that comprise it, and the connection between MSc and BSc program.
