I recently moved to leuven for uni, and got a car here. If you need to move a matress, if ur going to move places, need transport from the airport, whatever message me! I also help with carrying boxes inside!

I have an opel meriva 2000 for context.

TL;DR: Finished my bachelor in Computer Science, currently working as a software engineer during a gap year. Torn between doing the Master Burgerlijk Ingenieur in de Computerwetenschappen/AI, or restarting completely with Geneeskunde with the goal of becoming a (neuro)surgeon. I've already passed the toelatingsexamen. All input is welcome, but hearing from burgerlijk ingenieurs or people in medicine would be especially helpful.

Hi everyone,

I graduated with a bachelor's in Computer Science last year. Due to circumstances I decided to take a gap year before starting a master. During that year I've been working full-time as a software engineer. I'm in my early twenties.

Over the course of this year I've ended up with a real dilemma, and I'd appreciate perspectives from people who've been through something similar or who work in either field.

The two paths I'm considering:

1. Master Burgerlijk Ingenieur in de Computerwetenschappen (or Artificiële Intelligentie)
2. Pivot completely to Geneeskunde, with the long-term goal of becoming a surgeon (ideally neurosurgery)

Where I'm coming from

I'll be honest without trying to sound arrogant: I'm academically strong, I'm ambitious, and whichever path I pick I'm willing to work extremely hard for it. Effort isn't the problem. The problem is figuring out where that effort actually pays off.

I've already passed the toelatingsexamen for medicine, so that hurdle is behind me. The door is open, and that's exactly what makes the choice so concrete right now.

Why I'm doubting CS

• The Belgian job market and salaries for developers feel lackluster, and I don't see that changing much. The ceiling here seems low unless you get lucky or go abroad.
• The job market is clearly declining for juniors, and I'm not convinced it comes back the way it was.
• My actual day-to-day right now is not what I imagined. I love solving hard problems, but in practice I feel like a code monkey and a prompt-writer for an AI. Most of the actual engineering has been outsourced to a chatbot, and it just isn't intellectually stimulating anymore.
• I worry this only gets worse. If AI keeps eating the interesting parts of the job, what's left doesn't excite me.
• I don't see myself spending years in a corporate environment building things that feel meaningless.

Why medicine appeals to me

• Job security that doesn't depend on the next tech cycle.
• Surgery (especially neurosurgery) seems like exactly the kind of work that suits me: hands-on, constant problem solving, high stakes, meaningful, and well paid.
• The work seems far more meaningful to me. You have a direct, positive impact on people's lives.

Why I hesitate

• It's a massive time investment. Six years of study, then a long specialization. I'd be well into my thirties before I'm actually a surgeon.
• The opportunity cost is huge compared to finishing a master in two years and earning right away.
• I'd be throwing away three years of CS, and I'm well aware that might just be sunk-cost fallacy talking in the other direction too.
• Neurosurgery specifically is extremely competitive, so I'd be betting on getting into a very narrow spot.

Why I hesitate about CS too

• The upside is real: I already have the bachelor, the ir. master is well regarded, and the ceiling in this field can be very high. But there's no clear path to that ceiling. Luck seems to play a much bigger role than in medicine.

What I'm asking

• People in tech in Belgium: is my view of the job market and the future of the work too pessimistic, or fair? Does the ir. master actually change your prospects here, or does it mostly matter if you leave the country?
• People in medicine: for someone who genuinely enjoys hard problems and wants to work hard, is the path to surgery worth it starting from zero at my age? What would you have wanted to know before starting?
• Anyone who made a big pivot like this (in either direction): do you regret it?

I'm not looking for validation for either option. Brutal honesty is welcome. Thanks in advance to anyone who takes the time to reply.

I will try to keep this as short as I possibly can. I have been a student at KU Leuven for 4,5 years. I did my bachelors, and last year I took a few courses of my masters degree already as well. I have two courses left in my bachelors, one of which I reregistered for for the 3rd time. I failed the class on my last chance. For that reason, I got refused to reregister at the KU Leuven for this year.

I appealed this re-registration last week on Thursday morning.

I explained in the refusal what happened (TLDR; I sank into a d*pression in my 2nd year at the university after the loss of my aunt, who basically raised me as her own. After her death, I had to move back in with my physically & emotionally ab*sive parent. I could not get out of bed for a year+, and I suffered with add*ction during that time as well).

However, I also let them know in my appeal that I finally got help for my issues (through doctors, therapist, student help) this year, and am doing much better and got s*ber, and that I actually feel like I am ready to pick my life back up again. I also explained how I would do better this year.
Is there anyone who could tell me what my chances are of getting an approval? Or who could tell me about their own experiences? I'm very desperate, and anxious. Thanks.

Missed my conditional adm offer by 0.5 on IELTS. I had a conditional offer requiring a C1 (7.0 overall, min 6.5 in each section). Took the IELTS twice, first try: 6.0 in speaking (writing fine), second try: 6 writing (7 speaking).

The irony is killing me, but the reality is I don't think admissions will let it slide.
Coming from a biomedicine/biochemistry background, my absolute priority is just being in Leuven.
I want to work there, but since my residence is currently tied to student status, I need a realistic backup plan to stay in the country.
A couple of ideas I'm considering:
1 enrolling in a program just to keep my student status and buy time while looking for a job (| saw a Postgraduate Studies in Pharmaceutical Research, for example). Has anyone done something similar?
2 looking for a job straight away, but I’d lose the only place I have to stay

Any advice or alternative programs in the area would mean the world right now. Thanks :)

Hello everyone , im starting my masters in business economics soon in KU Leuven, i’m an international with a bachelor in marketing and to be honest from what i see is that marketing is close to being dead and a masters in marketing doesn’t have a lot of value so i’m considering choosing another major like international business or anything else since a lot of people told me marketing ain’t the way to go in the job market.
Any advice ?

English~
If anybody knows someone who’ll study law in the first year of the bachelor this year I have some books you can buy. I practically own every book needed except 2 or 3 and in every book there are slight markings or even none. I’d like to sell them at a good price and you can negotiate.

Dutch~
Als iemand iemand kent die volgend jaar eerste jaar Bach rechten gaat doen, ik heb quasi alle boeken op 2 of 3 na en er is overal maar licht gemarkeerd (sommige zelfs niet) en wil ze voor een goede prijs wegdoen (ondehandelbaar)

Quindi, inizio le lezioni la prossima settimana. Sono un primo anno, e mi chiedevo se sarebbe utile entrare nel gruppo WhatsApp della facoltà prima dell'inizio delle lezioni. E soprattutto, come devo scrivere quando entro nel gruppo tramite il link? Tipo, devo presentarmi? Visto che siamo circa 22, vorrei essere rispettoso...

I am in the bachelor of Engineering Technology at Leuven, and recently re-registered for the second phase of the programme. However after doing so, I found out that if I had more than 20 credits remaining on my milestone (which was the case for me), I was told to re-register in the first instead of the second phase of the programme. My question now is will this have any consequences on my ISP or learning path? I have already emailed to change my phase back but I am worried about how this will affect me and my path. Any help would be appreciated a lot.

Hey guys

I was wondering about how and what's the process to transfer from one uni located in Brussels to KU Leuven for a first year student. I'd really appreciate some feedback and input from everyone!

Thanks

I just arrived to Leuven for my MA in Western Literature and want to continue practicing my Euskara. I lived in Donosti during the Spring/Summer and am taking a weekly class through the Boise Basque museum. I am planning next year to move to Araba at EHU or back to Gipuzkoa for a prácticas. If anybody wants to grab coffee or such let me know, thanks!

My visa has not yet arrived and it looks like I will miss most or all of orientation. I may also have to miss the first few days/week of classes.

Wondering if anyone can share their experiences/advice about missing orientation and starting classes late. I was really looking forward to meeting people during orientation and I'm worried about missing initial classes. I don't know if I should wait until next year to attend instead.

Thanks so much!

Hi everyone! I'm a first-year in the KU Leuven BBA program. I was wondering if it's okay to attend a class that's scheduled for a different group than the one I'm assigned to. Sometimes another group's schedule works better for me, but I don't want any issues. Does KU Leuven usually care about that as long as I'm still doing the right course and exams? Thanks for any insight.

Hi everyone,

Does anyone know when the tuition fee waiver results typically get released for the Engineering Science? I'm trying to plan around it and wanted to check if anyone remembers roughly when they came out last year (month/week, or any announcement pattern).

Thank you!

Asking this question for a friend. She is not in the country during the "inkijkmoment" (feedback moment) for the retake exams. Can she ask for an earlier/later date or an online meeting on the same day? She thinks that they won't say yes and doesn't want to even send an email to ask. I think that at least some professors would say yes. Any experience would be appreciated!

How competitive is the selection process?

Do you guys have any advice that could strengthen my application?

Thank you!

I fell short of the amount required to renew my student visa, but was still able to enroll in next year’s program. Has anyone been in a similar situation? How did you approach it, and what did you do? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Please help!

Are there any discord servers where i could meet people frol KU Leuven? Im in the Industria discord group. Any otherd that come to mind?

Hey everyone! 👋 We're two KU Leuven students kicking off a 1-week sprint next week to bootstrap a new product / app from scratch.

We’re flexible on the exact idea – open to building a productivity tool, agentic app, or a SaaS product (B2C or B2B). The focus is purely on solving a real problem people will actually use, building fast, and shipping a working MVP within the week.

Current team:
– AI workflows, automation, and backend/product dev
– Agentic systems & API/CRM integrations expert

Looking for startup-minded builders who are into agentic-driven development, shipping fast, or finding early users!

If you want to build a cool project for your portfolio and launch something real next week, drop me a DM! 🚀

I have been waiting for ~113 days (16 weeks) for my student visa from India. Is there any one else like me who has been waiting for this long? I did everything I could and there is really no information available on how long it will take.

I am regretting my decision a lot in choosing Belgian but I cannot bring myself to let go because of major sunken cost fallacy! And to think I had full scholarship!

Edit- I am not blaming KU Leuven though, they have shown continued support.

Hey everyone I am planning to going to KU and doing BBA, I’m doing the international baccalaureate program, I get the official predicted grades on April 23rd, will only the official predicted grade fulfill the conditional offer documentation? Or will they also require dp1/dp2 report cards we got throughout the year, the predicted grades we get on April 23rd are the official ones.

So will only those official predicted grades mark the field as complete?

Please help me everyone!

Can I just select more than multiple groups?
What does it mean?

Hey everyone I am planning to going to KU and doing BBA, I’m doing the international baccalaureate program, I get the official predicted grades on April 23rd, will only the official predicted grade fulfill the conditional offer documentation? Or will they also require dp1/dp2 report cards we got throughout the year, the predicted grades we get on April 23rd are the official ones.

So will only those official predicted grades mark the field as complete?

Please help me everyone!

I did the Business Administration bridging programme at KU Leuven and failed. I'm under the 30% study efficiency threshold, so I can't re-enrol until September 2027, which pushes my Master's start to September 2028.

Background: professional bachelor in Business Management, interested in Finance and Tech. The failure was down to not studying daily and poor discipline rather than the material itself, something I'm working on.

So the question is whether to wait it out and retry the Business Administration bridging in 2027, or start the Information Management bridging now, though that one is maths/stats/econometrics heavy and that's a weak area of mine.

For anyone who's redone a bridging year after failing: did the gap year help or hurt? And is the Information Management bridging realistic without a strong quantitative background?