Information Free Electives

Academy Built Environment and Logistics (ABEL)

2021-2022
Introduction

From year 2, students are required to fill in ‘Free Electives’; it is part of their curriculum. All students
can fill in credit points with an activity of their choice.

Students individually choose those free electives which are an addition to the regular programme.
Free electives give students the possibility to make their studies personal and to work on their
personal development. The term ‘FREE elective' says it all: you are FREE to fill your free elective
hours by means of something you have proposed yourself.

Check your study manual how many credit points you must fill in. Before the graduation the activity
must be finished, but we advise to do it in the 2nd year. Because of internships in year 3/4.

There are two conditions:

1. for each credit, you must choose an activity that requires 28 hours of work;
2. you have to be able to explain why the activity is a valuable addition to your curriculum.
What do you want to learn and which competencies will you develop?

What is important:
You are responsible for the design and planning of your free electives.
Of course, your mentor can always offer advice.

In the next chapters you will find how to register and the possibilities you have for your free
electives.

Questions about the Free Electives?

Discuss them with your mentor or mail to free-electives@buas.nl.

Good luck!

Suzanne van Rijswijk (Spatial Developmen)

Ilse Hens (Logistics)

Contact: free-electives@buas.nl

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Information Free electives

Do you want to know how you can register for an activity? Read the information below.

Register for 2nd year students

1. Read this document carefully and choose an activity you like.
2. Contact the coordinator of your choice.
3. You will receive more information from him/her.
4. Start a.s.a.p. (= today!).
5. Discuss your choice with your mentor, during the next personal meeting, and fill in the
contract ’Contract Free Electives’ (check LMS).
6. Hand in the completely filled contract (by mail or personally), when your activity is assessed.

Register for 3rd, 4th year students

1. Are you already busy with your free electives?
• Fill in the ‘Contract free elective’, complete your activity and get the signatures and the
assessment.
• Need help? Talk to your mentor.
• When you finished your activity, hand in the contract by mail (free-elective@buas.nl).
• Make sure the signature of the assessor is on the contract.

2. Are you still looking for a free elective?

• Read this document carefully.
• Contact the coordinator of the activity you would like to do and ask if you can
participate.
• Start with the activity as soon as possible.
• Consult your mentor about your choices and fill in the contract together.
• When you finished your activity, hand in the contract by mail (free-elective@buas.nl).
• Make sure the signature of the assessor is on the contract.

Important for alle students:

• Check in Osiris that you registered for the free electives (see study manual); than your credit
points can be entered in the correct manner (after you are finished).
• Some activities are in a certain trimester or have a maximum amount of participants.
• You are responsible for your Free electives; your mentor is the advisor!
• Deadline of handing in the contract is: 1st of July
• Every exam week the credit points are placed in Osiris.

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Possibilities Free electives

There are various ways to satisfy your free electives:

A. 1-2 ec. Personal activities

B. 1-2 ec. Course / training Built Environment & Logistics
C. 1 ec. Ambassador Built Environment & Logistics
D. 1 ec. BEST training
E. 1-2 ec. SV BELO
F. 1-2 ec. Dutch possibilities for Dutch students
G. 2 ec. Dutch course for foreign students
H. 1-2 ec. Project logistics Experience of Supply Chain Management
I. 1-2 ec. Student assistant courses Excel, Economics, Mathematics,….
J. 1-2 ec. Student assistant Excel in Warehousing
K. 1-2 ec. Otherwise
L. 1-2 ec. Entrepreneurship
M. 1-2 ec. Urban Green
N. 1-2 ec. Participation with the industry of Logistics & Built Environment
O. 1-2 ec. Hackathon met Youth 4 Public Transport
P. 1-2 ec. How would you spend your travel time when using the BusinessLine?
Q. 1-2 ec. Project Marine Spatial Planning – simulation game
R. 1-2 ec. Zero-Emission City Logistics Maturity Model
S. 1-2 ec. Conceptual network design for urban perishable product supply chain
T. 1-2 ec. Food supply chain automation: process and technical innovation

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Explanation Free electives

A. Personal Activities (1 or 2 ECTS)

Coordinator: your mentor
If you choose a personal activity, make a plan of approach and discuss it with your mentor.
Make sure that you describe:
• What is your goal?
• What is your addition as a student?
• What did you learn already and will be important for your activity?
• Which competences are you going to use and which do you want to learn? Use the theory that you have
learned.
• Keep a logbook and write a (reflection) report.

Examples of personal activities:

1. Course at another education institution. You can also use your free electives to add breadth to your
education. In principle, the choice is yours, provided that the course you choose is a higher professional
education level, at least.

Have you always wanted to do a course “Event Management”, “Psychology” or some other course? Then
this is your chance! Bear in mind that you are allowed to broaden your scope to other education
institutions or universities beyond BUAS. You have to explore the possibilities yourself and then submit a
request to your mentor.
Check https://www.buas.nl/en/programmes for the various possibilities on BUAS.

2. Sign up for a refresher course Mathematics on the internet. For example: www.aleks.com

3. Do you want to improve your proficiency in a certain language? You can look for a website or check one of
the examples below:

All languages www.studytravel.com www.babbel.com www.lingohut.com

Dutch http://www.learndutch.org/ http://www.taalthuis.com/

French http://www.ambafrance-nl.org/spip.php?rubrique437

German http://www.goethe.de/ins/de/spr/deindex.htm
http://www.iik-duesseldorf.de/intensivkurse/sommerkurse.php
http://www.daad.de/deutschland/deutsch-lernen/wo-deutsch-
lernen/00496.de.html
Italian www.ladante.it
www.scuolaleonardo.com
http://www.dilit.it/
http://www.mester.com/
Spanish
http://www.linguaschools.nl/
http://www.erasmusinbarcelona.com/#
http://www.lingualearnenglish.nl/
English
http://www.brookes.ac.uk/international/english-and-pathway-courses/

Important:
• BUAS is not affiliated to the above institutes
• BUAS is not responsible for the quality, content or the course layout

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4. Sign up for an online course, for example: https://www.open.edu/openlearn/free-courses/full-
catalogue or https://learning.linkedin.com/

5. Familiarize yourself with the world of work: analyse the logistics processes of a business or event, what’s
happening in your municipality/neighbourhood in the field of spatial planning and/or traffic engineering,
including committee meetings. What are they involved in?

6. Observe a manager in his/her everyday work. You study leadership styles and establishes which style is
applicable to this particular manager. What is your leadership style, what suits you well? And why? What
would you do differently? Why isn’t the manager doing so?...etc

7. Interested in joining ESN (Erasmus Student Network Breda)? As a member, you get to work in a
multicultural team, gain practical experience connected to your studies, develop your professional skills
and have a lot of fun with all the new people you'll get to know. Join us if you have time, creativity and
enthusiasm to make student life in Breda even better! For more info visit: https://lnkd.in/dRwp2VX

8. Volunteer work with a social organization, association or foundation.

9. Write your own biography: where do you come from, where are you now, where do you want to go?

10. Search on internet or ask people you know for an activity for your free electives; discuss it with your
mentor.

B. Course / training at Built Environment / Logistics (1 or 2 ECTS)

Coordinator: teacher of the course/training you choose
It is possible to follow another course / training at another academy within Breda University of Applied
Sciences. So if you are at International Logistics Management you can follow the course ‘Automation
Techniques’ at International Logistics Engineering. And if you are a Dutch student you can take a course at the
Dutch Logistic program or Built Environment program. On LMS, Info Sources, you can find the study manuals of
the different Academies.

Important:
• You can’t choose a course/training that is in your own curriculum.
• Contact the teacher of the course and ask if you can participate.
• There are no guarantees you can follow the course/training you choose, because of the planning. You
yourself are responsible for checking this.
• To make an exam of the course you have chosen, you have to register in Osiris for the right
code (check your study manual for the code)

C. Ambassador Logistics & Built Environment (1 or 2 ECTS)

Coordinator International Spatial Development: Geraldine Houtschilt (Houtschilt.G@buas.nl)
Coordinator International Logistics: Rosa Hagenaars (Hagenaars.R@buas.nl)
Every year, Buas hold several open days and evenings, matching days, webinars and other promotion activities
to recruit new students. The help of you as a student is indispensable in these activities. After all, who can
better tell you about how things are going at Buas and your study program?

During these activities you will help with the preparation (construction and dismantling) for the open day, will
answering all the questions from prospective students or you take the student with you during your lectures for
a day. There will be an online meeting in advance, where everyone must attend. Do you enjoy promoting your
study program to prospective students? Sign in at the coordinator of your study program!

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D. BEST trainingen (1 ECTS)
Information: Minke Snels and Lizanne Hessels (studentendecanen ABEL, studentcounsellorABEL@buas.nl)
BEST stands for Better Studying. By better we do not mean raising the bar higher. Not at all, in fact. We would
like to contribute to our students' well-being in an easily accessible way. We do so by offering all sorts of
training courses that may help you to engage your studies in a pleasant way, as a result of which you feel a
stronger learner.

The existing BEST training courses are mainly skills training courses and behavioural training courses. Think, for
example: improving study behaviour, studying with a disability, assertiveness training, copying with fear of
failure or mindfulness.

For up-to-date information (and signing in), check your portal regularly: BESTtraining - Home (sharepoint.com)

E. Study association ‘sv BELO’ (1 or 2 ECTS)

Coordinator Loek Hellebrekers (hellebrekers.l@buas.nl)
BELO is the student organization within the Academy Built Environment & Logistics that is committed to parties
combined with knowledge. We are starting this year with a fresh start!
So if you like to organize drinks and parties and think about how we can involve the professional field to share
knowledge, then join us and contact the coordinator!
There are various possibilities: just helping out, organizing activities, be part of the board and chairman, or…..
Indicate where you are interested in!

F. Dutch possibilities for Dutch speaking students (1-2 ECTS)

Coordinator: your mentor
If you are a Dutch speaking student, you can look at our Dutch possibilities of the Free electives (= vrije
studieruimte /profileringsruimte) on LMS. Contact your mentor and discuss what you would like to do.

Projects / activities within BUas

G. Dutch course for foreign students (2 ECTS)
Coordinator Frank van Heijningen (Heijningen.F@buas.nl)
If you are a foreign student and you would like to learn the Dutch language, contact the coordinator.

H. Project logistics Experience of Supply Chain Management (BLOKKO2.0) (1 ECTS)

Coordinator: Jan van Elderen (Elderen.J@buas.nl)
Do you want to assist at the first years project BLOKKO in trimester 2? Contact the coordinator.

I. Student assistant Excel, Economics, Mathematics,…? (1 ECTS)

Coordinator: Ilse Hens (hens.i@buas.nl)
Are you interested in assisting in a 1st year course as excel, economics, mathematics, or another course?
Contact the coordinator and discuss how you can help!

J. Interested in Excel? (1 ECTS)

Coordinator: Azadeh Irajifar (irajifar.a@buas.nl)
Are you interested in calculations in excel and designing a warehouse layout? Develop a warehouse layout in
excel and determine the details of a warehouse structure including isles, columns, shelving, etc….

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K. Otherwise? (1-2 ECTS)
Coordinator: Serah Calitz (calitz.s@buas.nl)
You will conduct preliminary research into student diversity and inclusivity within Built Environment (BE)
programmes in the Netherlands. Building on these findings you will help set-up a series of topics and/or
themes for an interactive zoom and/or podcast series that aims to inform prospective students about the
various BE professions with the goal of welcoming a more diverse student population into our field.

L. Entrepreneurship (1 or 2 ECTS)
Coordinator: Semi Torun (Torun.S@buas.nl)
Do you want to know more about entrepreneurship? Do you want to start your business or discover if you
might be an entrepreneur? Please contact the coordinator.

M. Project ‘Urban Green’ (1-2 ECTS)

Coordinator: Robert van Dongen (Dongen.R@buas.nl)
Nature and natural elements in cities, ‘Urban Green’, make cities more liveable. There is an ever-increasing
body of scientific evidence pointing to a strong positive relation between ‘green’ on the one hand and wellbeing
and quality of life on the other.
People are more content with their neighbourhood, they recover faster from illness, they restore more easily
from stress, they feel they are more healthy and they generally are. Urban Green stimulates people to be active
(running, playing), it facilitates social interaction and leads to less aggression and vandalism. Urban Green
structures the city, it beautifies, it offers orientation, it cools through shade and evaporation, it cleans the air
and the soil, it prevents a lot of water problems, etc.
For a PhD-research project on optimal design of urban green, several side projects are available as free
electives. Depending on personal preference and questions arising in current research, students and the
lecturer will decide what can be done. Please contact Robert van Dongen if you have any questions.

Projects / activities from the industry

N. Participation with the industry of Logistics & Built Environment (1 of 2 ECTS)
Coördinator Spatial Development: Don Guikink (Guikink.D@buas.nl) and
Coordinator Logistics: Bas Groot (Groot.B@Buas.nl)
Participation in projects of Logistics & Built Environment jointly executes with the industry and social
organisations. We cooperate with social organisations and companies on different projects. In these
cooperation knowledge, new applications of knowledge are developed and knowledge from the educational
environment is valorised in the industry and vice versa. At https://wow.shapingsociety.nl you’ll find some
examples of current and finished projects.

Conditional upon the running projects and conditions, students might be involved as well. Do you want to know
which possibilities there are for you? Contact Don Guikink or Bas Groot. Candidates might be selected on
knowledge, skills and attitude.

O. Hackathon met Youth 4 Public Transport (1 of 2 ECTS)

Coördinator: Nick van Apeldoorn (Apeldoorn.N@buas.nl)
New ideas and innovation are the cornerstone of every successful employee and organization. To stimulate this
way of thinking we offer a three-day hackathon in collaboration with Youth 4 Public Transport.

How does it work? Every year, industry partners offer our students a challenge to solve in three days. Students
with different backgrounds work together to solve these challenges with good concepts or products. The
winner gets the possibility to compete in the international finale against winners from other universities from
different countries. Your expenses for travel to that finale are covered by Y4PT. Past locations were Dubai,
Stockholm and Moscow and most likely the winner of this year will go to Melbourne Australia or Dubai

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depending on the COVID-19 situation. In last Hackathon, 40 students competed at BUas and got 1 EC in three
days. This year, the hackathon is planned to take place form the 28th until the 30th of April at BUas.
Pre-registration is already possible through this link, the challenges will follow later.

For more information you can contact Apeldoorn.n@buas.nl

P. How would you spend your travel time when using the BusinessLine? (1 of 2 ECTS)
Coördinator: Geert de Leeuw (Leeuw.G@buas.nl)
Every passenger uses their travel time in a different way based on their personal interests. Where one
person prefers to listen to music, the other spend their time traveling working, playing a game or
reading a book. A collective, but privately organized mobility service (organized by employers) offers the
opportunity to rethink the concept of collective mobility for the daily commute. Rethink the mobility
service from the perspective of a company’s culture or rethink a concept that fits the smartest region of
the Netherlands, the Brainport Region. Propelled by Covid-19, new (more hybrid) ways of working are
becoming more accepted and seen in practice. People travel more to meet others (colleagues) instead
of traveling just to be present at the office. What triggers your mind for new collective mobility service
(organized by employers) when we address trends such as: space to meet during, lifelong learning,
exploring synergies between companies in the same region and creating awareness on the societal
challenges the region faces. What would employees want while traveling? What is the perspective of
employers on the commute time of their employees and can every traveler be satisfied by the smartest
concept you will think of?

Q. Project Marine Spatial Planning – simulation game (1-2 ECTS)

Coordinator (AGM): Igor Mayer (mayer.i@buas.nl) and Harald Warmelink (warmelink.h@buas.nl)
The MSP Challenge Simulation Platform is a serious game (simulation game) dedicated to Marine Spatial
Planning, so the players simulate the process of planning at sea. The platform has been in constant development
at Cradle, AGM’s, research & development department from BUAS since 2016. With simulations regarding energy
production, shipping traffic and ecosystem balance, the platform is being very useful to bring awareness to
stakeholders on complexity of the system in which they are operating in, as well as engaging them in the process
of planning. At the moment there are 3 editions ready and open source (North Sea, Baltic Sea and Clyde Marine
Region) and one in development (Adriatic Sea). Click here to find out more about this project.

What you will be doing

We could use your help to either help apply the platform during (online) game sessions, use the platform to study
actual spatial planning scenarios, test new features of the platform (or even think of new ones), work on creating
tutorials or other materials about the use of the platform, update the data layers in one of the editions of the
game (North Sea, Baltic Sea, Clyde Marine Region, Adriatic Sea editions at present), support in developing a totally
new edition/region. That will depend on what we are working on at the moment you join us.
Do you like to work with geodata, are interested in international planning, stakeholder engagement, or are you
enthusiastic about building models? Join us.

R. Zero-Emission City Logistics Maturity Model

Coordinator: Thato Motloung (Motloung.t@buas.nl)
Zero emission city logistics is an area that is receiving a lot of attention due to the timelines set by the Paris
agreement to limit the emission of greenhouse gases to 2°C by 2030 (Rogelj et al., 2016). This is particularly true
for the Netherlands where various projects have been initiated in the area of city logistics and moves have been
made to turn inner cities into zero emission zones in 25 of the G40 municipalities who have signed the Urban
Logistics Implementation Agenda. This has called for the need to gauge the progress of companies involved in
inner city distribution towards achieving zero emission logistics within cities which applies for both the private
sector as well as the public sector.

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In this assignment, a zero-emission city logistics QuickScan will be executed at a company involved in inner city
logistics either as a shipper, carrier or consignee, the purpose of the scan being to evaluate the status quo of
their zero-emission inner city logistics efforts. This QuickScan will have multiple stakeholders in the public,
private and academic sector and as such attention will be paid to relevance of the information for each
stakeholder.

1. Workshop
The zero-emission maturity model will be introduced and discussed, with scenarios on how it is to be executed.

2. QuickScan
The students are to find 4 companies based in or delivering to the city centre where they will conduct walk
throughs on the premises, collect photographic evidence and interview the relevant parties using the
QuickScan questionnaire, the groups may choose to include other questions in addition to those provided.
After the QuickScan, the students will write a 3-5 page QuickScan report for each company including.
- An analysis of the QuickScan results (2-3½ pages)
- A maturity model indication of which levels each dimension scored for the company (1 page, use
matrix provided)
- Company specific recommendations to reach the next level in their zero emission city logistics (divided
into quick wins, medium term and long term solutions) (½ - 1 page)

3. Benchmark
The maturity models for each of the companies will be benchmarked according to whether the company is a
shipper, consignee or carrier thus resulting in an average score indicated on a maturity model. A short
benchmark report will be written on the high level outlook for zero emission city logistics. (3-5 pages per group)

4. Reflection
A reflection survey will be distributed at the end of the assignment to review the assignment and student
experiences, along with this, the student will submit a logbook.

For any further information or questions related to the assignment please contact the coordinator.

S. Urban perishable product supply chain: conceptual network design

Coordinator: Letty Zhu (zhu.l@buas.nl)
In this topic, we will focus on fresh food distribution, which produced by urban farms. As the name tells, urban
farm is a farm located in a city or next to a city. Due to space constraints, urban farm normally has a small scale
compared to professional extensive farm, with a low output rate (less than 5 pallets per pick). Compared to an
extensive farm with at least a 20ft container per pick, 5 pallets are a microscopic amount for traditional perishable
product distribution system. Clearly, urban farm cannot adopt conventional bulk perishable product distribution
network. Questions raise: how does urban perishable product supply chain look like? What are the differences
compare to traditional bulk perishable product supply chain? How should we design it?

T. Food supply chain automation: process and technical innovation

Coordinator: Letty Zhu (zhu.l@buas.nl)
During food processing, human contact and all possible biohazard contamination should be avoided. Especially
now during Corona period. Highly automated handling process seems to be a good solution. However, majority
of fresh agriproducts are very delicate, it is always challenging to increase automation in their logistic process.
The key question is: in which steps of perishable product logistics are worth to be automated? What are possible
solutions? And how should we have implemented it?

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Appendix: Rules Free Electives

• The student himself/herself is responsible for giving definite shape to the free electives in good time. The

department offers support by providing opportunities.

• For a number of options in the framework of the free electives there is a minimum/maximum size to the

group of participants. Therefore, be on time, because you may not always be honoured to your preference;

may be either too many or too few participants.

• Some programmes only actually take place with enough participants. In the case of too few registrations, the

department manager concerned will decide whether the course will be offered.

• It is not possible to carry over free elective credits gained during previous years; it has to take place now or I

the future. As an addition to your CV.

• If the student chooses an external course / training program, admission is granted on the basis of

documentation provided. Here the fraud regulation is enforced.

• The third (and fourth)- year students, who still have free electives not filled in, have to make an appointment

with their study coach from year 1 / 2 or the manager of your academy.

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