We can imagine that it is not always easy to study mostly from home in these corona times. Therefore, we would like to know what is going on among all our first-year students.

Dear first-year students,

Your well-being is important to the UT. We sincerely hope that you are doing well and you enjoy your new study program. We can, however, imagine that it is not always easy to study mostly from home in these corona times. Therefore, we would like to know what is going on among all our first-year students. How are you doing? Are you usually feeling on top of the world or are you dealing with stress quite often? Do you feel embedded in the student community? And how do you experience your hybrid education? Perhaps you have already received the email about this, but from the study association we would like to support this study by also sharing it here!

Why do it?

1. Your answers will help your study program to improve their education and help them get insight in how you are doing
2. You will receive personal feedback in November, which provides you with insight in how you are doing compared to other first-year students. We can guide you towards the right support if needed.
3. You have a chance of winning €50!

Please click this link to fill in the survey. The deadline for this survey is the 5th of November. It will take you roughly 10-15 minutes.

You can watch the following video (1 min) which explains the research further: https://vimeo.com/467101732.

On November 12, the open day for prospective master students will take place. The university is looking for people who are willing to help out organizing this day.

On the 12th of November there will be an open day to help prospective students select a master program at our University. This year that day will be online, for obvious reasons. With this new format come some challenges and we need your help to make the open day for Computer Science into a success! We are looking for students that would like to help out with:

-A short contribution to an introductory video, where you tell about your own motivation and experience in your study programme;

-Digital chats, where you can help answer questions by the visitors;

-Chat moderation, manage questions from the visitors and brings them up during the live presentation;

-Technical support, where you can help avoid those awkward moments where the technology does not work out and where you can help manage the livestream.

Besides some preparation, you will only be working during the open day itself. The time investment is limited, and your hours will be reimbursed by the University, making this the perfect side-job!

(One caveat: for students who need a work permit and do not have one yet, we will have to organise payment in some other way; we can’t ignore that requirement.)

If you are interested in this job, or would like more information, please contact Kevin Witlox (k.h.d.witlox@student.utwente.nl).

Wednesday the 7th of October a Question & Answer session will take place for the TCS students, the programme director and the programme management will answer your question.

During this Question & Answer session the programme director will start with a small talk about the current state of affairs of the programme. Afterwards the programme staff will answer the questions you have about your study or the TCS programme in general. To prepare for this Q&A we ask you to send any questions you already have beforehand to education@inter-actief.net or put them in our Discord. This helps the programme staff prepare for this session, and answer your questions as best as possible. If you think of any questions during the session you are free to ask them there live.

So save the date: Wednesday the 7th of October, at 19:30.

This session is for both bachelor and master TCS students. Further information will also be provided by the the programme.

Do you want to help your fellow students and earn a bit extra on the side? Register yourself as tutor at Inter-Actief, and we will refer students to you.

If you are or want to become a tutor, send an email to education@inter-actief.net. We will add you to our list of available tutors, and refer students to you when they come to us.

The Programme Committee - Computer Science is looking for new student members.

If you would like to have a say in how Computer Science at this university changes, this is the right committee for you.

We meet monthly to discuss and decide on how to improve the CS curriculum, inspect the feedback given by the students about the modules/courses and encourage module coordinators/lecturers to reflect on the modules/courses in order to improve them every year. Any large modifications are brought to us and we do our best to inspect and improve them. The committee consists of teachers, students and other programme staff. To find out more visit www.utwente.nl/en/tcs/organisation/programme-committee/.

If you are a computer science student and this sounds like something for you please send an email to Niek Khasuntsev (n.a.khasuntsev@student.utwente.nl).

The university is gradually opening more for on campus education, but it is very important we adhere to the measures against the corona virus.

If you have mild complaints or symptoms, do not come to physical lectures or exams. If you have an exam or another mandatory lecture, email your professor and the study advisor, they will do their best to accommodate this as well as possible. In the event of a missed exam, you can contact the study advisor to try to arrange an additional resit.

On a more positive note: The resource booker of the University is once again offering study places and project rooms for students. Again keep in mind the rules set by the University!

The 42nd board of I.C.T.S.V. has been appointed!

At the GMM of 1 September 2020, the 41st board made way for its successors. The 42nd board has been charged as follows:

• Chairman - Jelle Maas
• Secretary and Officer of educational affairs - Willem Schooltink
• Treasurer - Tom Grooters
• Officer of internal affairs - Lars van Arkel
• Officer of external affairs - Gilian Schrijver

From left to right: Lars, Willem, Jelle, Tom, Gilian

Unfortunately we are not able to receive members in our association room. This, of course, does not mean you cannot come to us.

Inter-Actief has set up a service desk in the Educafé, in collaboration with Scintilla and Abacus. You can come to us there with all you questions.

We hope to see you all soon!

With pain in our hearts we inform you that the beloved Harry Aarts has passed away at the age of 59, on Sunday the 9th of August.

Harry was an enthusiastic Mathematics professor beloved by many students, because of his enthusiastic teaching style and patient support for all students. Harry had worked at the university for almost 25 years, at the EEMCS faculty.

Within Inter-Actief Harry Aarts was so well appreciated that he managed to win almost every Computer Science teaching award for which he was nominated. For this reason a special clause had to be added to the award that stated professors could only be nominated every other year, the so-called "Harry Aarts" clause.

We will miss Harry dearly, with his friendly smile, and his clear passion for teaching.

Everyone has the opportunity to share their memories and stories of Harry via this website.

Our deepest condolences to his family and friends.

On behalf of the Board of Inter-Actief.

The theme for next year's lustrum has been announced!

The 8th lustrum of Inter-Actief will take you on a trip down memory lane, reliving the moments and memories that brought us to where we are now. We will celebrate 40 years of history and together we will create new memories in a year filled with activities and entertainment. The pixels that create our association - that’s what this lustrum is about.

You can find the theme announcement here!

For the upcoming year, the candidate board is looking into setting up a yearbook/almanac committee.

This committee will be responsible for the development of an awesome yearbook/almanac that displays everything that Inter-Actief has had to offer throughout the year(s), for example with information on members, committees, activities, etc. It should provide members with an item that brings back amazing memories whenever they read it through in the future. As long as that goal is kept in mind, there is lots of freedom when it comes to the actual contents.

If you are interested in joining the committee that will be responsible for creating such a memorable piece of Inter-Actief's history, do not hesitate and send an email to board@inter-actief.net!

To thank all teachers for their hard work in quickly switching to online education, the teachers of Q3 have all been awarded an educational bouquet!

The past few weeks our education has been vastly different than before. Lectures are online instead of in lecture halls, tests have been changed so they can be taken remotely and everyone is now working from home.

This massive change required some effort from students, but more importantly, it required an enormous amount of adaptability from the teachers. Within the span of a week, they were able to completely change their courses and modules to an online version where students could continue learning, albeit from their own homes. Of course, there were some hiccups along the way and everything isn’t perfect, but the overall way everything has been adapted to online education is great!

Over the past weeks, we have received lots of messages of praise for different teachers on the responsiveness and adaptability of entire module teams as well as specific teachers. Other messages specifically state the quality of the online lectures. Because all teachers of Q3 have worked incredibly hard to still give the students the education they deserve, even in these troubling times, we think that all of them deserve an educational bouquet for their hard work!

As there are so many teachers, we created a slightly different version of our normal 'educational bouquet'; a card with a message from the students which can be planted to create a beautiful bouquet of flowers, which will be sent to all teachers as soon as possible!

All teachers who will be receiving the educational bouquet: Pieter-Tjerk de Boer, Geert Heijenk, Bernd Meijerink, Rico van Lingen, Evonne van Genderen, Marc Uetz, Faizan Ahmed, Carlos Budde, Ruben Hoeksma, Jasper de Jong, Walter Kern, Stefan Klootwijk, Rom Langerak, Bodo Manthey, Lerna Pehlivan, Jan Willem Polderman, Victor Reijnders, Alexander Skopalik, Yeray Barrios Fleitas, Ansgar Fehnker, Luis Ferreira Pires, Jeroen Klein Brinke, Patrick Smith, Jeff White, Sage Cammers-Goodwin, Maurice van Keulen, Christin Seifert, Andreas Peter, Tom van Dijk, Marco Bekooij, Marielle Stoelinga, Djurre van der Wal, Marianne Junger, Nicola Strisciuglio, Mannes Poel, Faiza Bukhsh, Elena Mocanu, Karin Groothuis-Oudshoorn, Anna Sperotto, Aiko Pras, Jair Cardoso de Santanna, Maarten Everts, Jasper Goseling, Joost Pieter Katoen, Marcus Gerhold, Marieke Huisman, Susan Bayhan, Leon de Vries, João Moreira, Wallace Corbo Ugulino, Marten van Sinderen, Rob Bemthuis, Adina Aldea, Asad Abdiesfandani, Anton Stoorvogel, Martijn Koot, Heather Wilson, Lucas Meertens, Jos van Hillegersberg, Efthymios Constantinides, Lesley Broos, Abhista Abhistha, Verena Schulze Greiving-Stimberg, Joyce van Baaren, Hans Moonen, Ellen van Oost, Maya Daneva, João Luis Moreira, Daniel Smits, Olivia Plant, Bart Nieuwenhuis, Guido Bruinsma, Mike Monson

Do you know someone who is extremely committed to improve the quality of education or is always willing to help students without hesitation? Then, what are you waiting for? Nominate him or her for the education bouquet! Think for example of a teacher who gives extra lectures or a student assistent who is making hours in overtime to help each and everyone of you! You can nominate someone by going to this page.

Overview of awarded bouquets