On 11 November, the first graduates of the two-year master's program in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Groningen will receive their diploma. The new, English-taught engineering program offers students the opportunity to prepare for a career in the digital and high-tech industry or in scientific research.
The official graduation ceremony will be attended by representatives of the Province of Fryslân, the municipality of Smallingerland, and Innovatiecluster Drachten, the cooperation partners in the Smart Factories specialization.
Master's degree in Mechanical Engineering
In the 2019-2020 academic year, the University of Groningen (RUG) has started the master's program in Mechanical Engineering. This engineering program falls under the Faculty of Science and Engineering (FSE) and offers the specializations Advanced Instrumentation, Smart Factories and Smart and Green Energy Systems 2022-2023.
Factory of the future
Thanks to the collaboration between the University of Groningen (Campus Fryslân), Innovatiecluster Drachten (ICD), the municipality of Smallingerland and the province of Fryslân, the specialization Smart Factories could be developed within the Mechanical Engineering course.
What is unique is that students in the second year of this program do their graduation project at a company that is affiliated with ICD. For example, the RUG, together with the high-tech companies, trains students to design intelligent, coherent and tailor-made production processes for the factory of the future.
Technical career
This set-up also makes it easier for students to come into contact with the high-tech SMEs in the northern region and they can experience that they can simply stay in the northern Netherlands for an interesting and challenging technical career.
Design new machine at Philips Drachten
One of the graduates, Johannes Tjepkema, completed his master's degree with a design assignment at Philips Drachten. There he worked in the R&D team on the development of a new machine. Tjepkema: 'I got a lot of satisfaction from the internship assignments that the affiliated companies of the Innovatiecluster Drachten offered! For the assignments I had to draw up a plan myself, implement it and involve the right people.'
Baby Item Quality Control System
Marco Oosterhaven is also graduating now. He completed both the master's degree in Mechanical Engineering and Industrial Engineering. For Mechanical Engineering he did a research project into the development and applicability of a new piezoelectric actuator with memory properties. He completed his studies with a design assignment at Philips Drachten, where he designed a quality control system for baby items.
'For me it was ideal that I could follow this training in the North, otherwise I would not have done it. Thanks to the help of the ICD it was easy to find a job!'
Marco Oosterhaven
More information
- The master's degree in Mechanical Engineering could be developed thanks to a financial contribution from the European Union through the European Regional Development Fund.
- The festive ceremony on 11 November will take place in the Lutheran Church in Groningen, in the presence of professors Bayu Jayawardhana – program director of the Mechanical Engineering master's program at the University of Groningen – and Rob Timmermans – vice dean of the FSE faculty – and Pietie Kloosterman of the Province of Fryslân, mayor Jan Rijpstra and Wim Burgers of the municipality of Smallingerland and Joost Krebbekx, program manager of Innovatiecluster Drachten.