Expat centre Leiden opens its doors
Vice-President of the Executive Board Willem te Beest and Leiden’s Councillor for Economic Affairs Marc Witteman will open the Leiden Expat Centre on Thursday 21 January. The Centre is housed in the Visitor Centre Leiden, which opened last year on the Stationsweg.
- Vice-President of the Executive Board Willem te Beest and Leiden’s Councillor for Economic Affairs Marc Witteman will open the Leiden Expat Centre on Thursday 21 January. The Centre is housed in the Visitor Centre Leiden, which opened last year on the Stationsweg.
- Information centre
- The Expat Centre Leiden is an information centre for the many foreign knowledge workers who have settled in and around Leiden. Their present number is estimated at 3,000 and that number is expected to grow when the economy recovers.
- Expat officers
- The ELC will have a modest start. ‘Really, all we will do initially is provide information,’ stresses Agta Kockmann, one of the two expat officers that the ELC is deploying. ‘We cannot take care of everything for the people who come to us for help.’ Ms Kockmann is the manager of the Visitor Centre Leiden (VCL) and is employed by Leiden University. Together with her colleague Ellen Smit of the Leiden Bio Science Park Foundation she staffs the ELC’s back office.
Agta Kockmann: ‘Our goal is to help knowledge workers become ‘good citizens’ of Leiden.’
- Desk and website
- The VCL has a special information desk for expats. The back office comes into action when someone has a special request. There is also the website, the virtual ECL, where a mass of information can be found. From Friday 22 January, all visitors are welcome; the website will be launched on the same date.
- Joint initiative
- The ECL was created at the initiative of the Leiden Bio Science Park, Leiden Marketing, Leiden University, the city of Leiden, the Chamber of Commerce, Businesses Association BSP and legal counsel agency Teekens Karstens. The province of South Holland and the Ministry of Economic Affairs are giving financial support.
- Clusters of information needs
- What kind of questions is the ECL expecting? ‘It varies,’ Kockmann says. ‘Companies that employ lots of expats usually have their own expertise and often find housing themselves. Generally speaking, we can distinguish three clusters in the expat’s information need. First, they need information about technical formalities such as visas, permits, registering in Leiden, and service; second, information about housing, schools and health services; and finally, information about things to do in Leiden. Our goal is to help knowledge workers become ‘good citizens’ of Leiden and to make them feel at home.’
- Pretty much the same
- Knowledge workers can come from all corners of the globe, but currently most of them are West-Europeans. Expats don’t behave very differently at all from the Dutch, Kockmann has noticed. ‘Singles and couples with no children prefer to live in the old city centre, while people with families would rather live in a suburb or in one of the neighboring towns.’
- Short or long
- How long does the average expat stay? Kockmann: ‘We see cases of both short and long stays. Some people come here for no more than six months, others stay for years.’ This means that they are not all anxious to rent a home. ‘Some expats would rather buy a house.’
When asked whether there are enough homes to let for this group, Kockmann answers: ‘This is a special niche in the market which is serviced by specialized agencies. We ourselves are agents for homes offered by SLS Wonen.’
In time, the ECL expects to expand the services it provides.
(19 January 2010)
