Chinese PhD candidates with scholarships in the Netherlands report to embassy

Chinese PhD candidates with a scholarship from the China Scholarship Council (CSC) have to report to their embassy: they are supposed to fill in a form about their progress every semester and email it to the embassy. Those with scholarships to study in the Netherlands are obligated to do this as well. That's per a report published by Delta, the independent journalistic platform from the Delft University of Technology. The editorial team in Delft has a copy of one of these forms.

Form
The embassy asks PhD candidates with scholarships for a brief summary of the progress of their research. The form has to be signed by their professor or supervisor.

It is not clear whether this actually happens in practice. Delta spoke to several Chinese PhD candidates with scholarships, who wished to remain anonymous because they fear reprisals by the Chinese government. They don’t take the form very seriously. “There are around 2,000 PhD candidates from China in the Netherlands right now. Do you really think the embassy has time to read through all our forms?” one of them told Delta.

Research
In Germany, it came to light last month that some Chinese PhD candidates are required to keep their embassy or consulate informed about their research and contacts. Moreover, family members in China have to act as personal guarantors for these doctoral students. They have to pay the costs if the PhD candidate terminates the programme prematurely, if their academic performance is inadequate or if they do not return to China on time after the PhD programme. This can mean a sum of up to 75,000 euros.

Alarmed, the Minister of Education, Robbert Dijkgraaf, announced last week that an investigation is to be carried out into “the total number of PhD candidates with a CSC scholarship in the Netherlands and the disciplines in which they are active”. The investigation also aims to clarify “the type of contract conditions” under which the PhD candidates came to work in the Netherlands.