Program Overview

Information Sciences Programme

The Information Sciences programme at VU Amsterdam is a one-year, full-time Master's programme that focuses on responsible digital transformation. It is the number one programme of its kind in the Netherlands, emphasizing responsible, sustainable, and socially aware software and data systems.

Programme Overview

The programme has a unique multidisciplinary focus on digital socio-technical systems and sustainability in a broad sense. Teaching is composed of compulsory core courses, a selection of elective courses, and a Master's project in Information Sciences. For the project, students can choose to take a professional internship with a partner organisation or carry out cutting-edge research on a topic of their choice.

Curriculum

The Master programme Information Sciences educates a new generation of IT academic professionals who create inclusive and sustainable socio-technical systems to support the needs of modern society and organizations. The programme specializes in the creative exploration of complex multidisciplinary problems and a broad understanding of the role of IT in creating a sustainable digital society.

• Courses on offer cover topics like:
  • Digitalization and sustainability
  • Digital architecture
  • The disruption of eco-systems by IT
  • Questions of ethics and privacy
  • A digital transition and sustainability portfolio course
• Research is also an important component of the programme, especially when it comes to writing the Master's thesis.
• Students take an academic research course that teaches both qualitative and quantitative methodologies for performing academic research.
• Based on the thesis design, students carry out their Master Project Information Sciences, which takes the form of either an internship or a research project.

Student Journeys

Students can tailor the curriculum of the Information Sciences programme to meet their career goals. There are three suggested student journeys that can help prepare for various career paths:

• IT Consultant/Data Analyst: This role bridges context-driven needs and constraints, and technical solutions, often using data visualization, reporting tools, and statistical analysis to uncover insights and optimize performance.
• Digital Architect: A digital architect designs and oversees the development of digital systems and platforms, ensuring they align with business goals, societal demands, and technological trends.
• Digital Sustainability Officer: A DSO focuses on ensuring that digital transformation efforts are environmentally and socially sustainable.

Compulsory Courses

• Master Project Information Sciences
• Digitalization and Sustainability
• Knowledge Organization
• Digital Architecture
• The Social Web
• Research Methodology and Thesis Design

Information Sciences Advisory Board

The programme's content and exit qualifications are reviewed every year by the Professional Advisory Board, composed of engaged professionals and excellent alumni of the Master Information Sciences.

Members of the Information Sciences Advisory Board

• Jannie Minnema, Managing Director European Operations at FarmTrace
• Bas van der Raadt, enterprise architect, founder hapsah.org
• Wiebren van der Zee, CIO Domain Expert - Sustainable IT at ABN AMRO
• Floris de Jong, ICT Architect at Dutch Council for Refugees

Integration within Research and Partnership Networks

The Master in Information Sciences builds on the world-class reputation of the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the areas of software and sustainability, user-centric data science, and decentralized information society engineering. The programme is also actively involved in the Network Institute (NI), the Amsterdam Sustainability Institute (ASI), and the Digital Sustainability Center (DISC). Students enrolled in the Master Information Sciences have an opportunity to conduct research projects at one of the partner institutes, enabling them to combine academic excellence, relevance for practice, and societal impact.