Leiden and Utrecht universities are cutting back on some more unpopular courses to save money, as part of the right-wing cabinet’s decision to slash spending on education.

Utrecht has confirmed it is planning to cancel its German, French, Islam and Arabic, Italian, Celtic and religious studies from the 2026-2027 academic year.

The six degree courses, all run by the faculty of humanities, attract fewer than 25 students a year and are no longer economically viable, the university said in a statement.

“We have been maintaining a range of degrees that have become unaffordable over time,“said dean Thomas Vaessens. The government cutbacks have added significantly to the problems, he said.  

Leiden

Leiden University’s humanities department is also reportedly looking at cutting back on some degrees, although these have not been confirmed. In total it is considering cutting 300 individual courses, and that will lead to several dozen redundancies.

According to university news website Mares, bachelor degrees in African Studies and Latin American Studies will be cut, while Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and South and Southeast Asian studies will be merged into a new course – Asian Studies.

French, German and Italian will also be merged into a single bachelor’s degree in European languages and culture. In terms of Middle Eastern Studies, all specialisations (so-called tracks) in Middle Eastern Studies – Persian, Turkish, Hebrew, Islamic Studies, Arabic and Modern Middle Eastern Studies – will be scrapped.

Mares says the faculty is in severe financial trouble and must make substantial budget cuts. This is down to students obtaining fewer credits, a decrease in the number of PhD completions and increasing wage costs.

According to the most recent prognosis, the deficit is expected to reach €5.7 million a year from 2026 and this does not include the new cabinet’s announced budget cuts.

“People are definitely panicking about this. It’s all anyone is talking about’, Korean Studies programme chairman Remco Breuker told the paper. “International staff members, in particular, feel threatened.”

The cuts have not yet been formally approved.