The way our study programmes are organized can be somewhat different from how it is organized at your home university. We summarize in the following sections the broad outline's of the university studies in Belgium and study programmes at EPL.
It is always important to distinguish between coming to study as a regular student or joint degree student for a full Bachelor or Master programme and coming as an exchange student for a semester or a full academic year, thus choosing specific courses that will fit into the study programme followed at your home institution.
University studies in Belgium
Since 2005 and following the Bologna system set up by the European Union, the Belgian university curriculum is divided into 2 basic cycles:
- 1st Cycle: Bachelor programme (3 year-study cycle)
Basic training, development of self capacities to the university degree courses: work autonomy, critical spirit, a good grasp of courses, some research in connection with the selected field of knowledge. The admission to the bachelor degree in engineering requires to pass successfully the entrance examination, which includes a mathematical part and a general part.
The bachelor programme is composed of 180 ECTS spread out over 3 years. It includes a common part of 90 ECTS during the first three semesters (i.e. a year and a half), a Major of 60 ECTS and a Minor field of 30 ECTS. The Major courses includes a part common to all engineering specialties of 15 ECTS and a part specific to each engineering specialty of 45 ECTS.
- 2nd Cycle: Master programme (2 year-study cycle)
The master degree allows the student to acquire knowledge in connection with the discipline as well as competences necessary for a future job, teaching or research career.
This Master programme follows the 1st cycle programme (made of 180 ECTS) and is obtained with 120 ECTS spread over the 2 years.
A figure about the way these 2 study cycles are organized at UCL can be found here.
Complementary master programmes in one year are organized for few diplomas.
What are ECTS?
ECTS is the weighting given for a course. A major course generally has 5 up to 7 ECTS. A smaller one has 3 up to 5 ECTS.
For information, a 5 ECTS course is generally equivalent to around 60 hours of study.
A general information page on ECTS at UCL is also available.