In the second year, a region other than Sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia and South Asia may be studied but only with the permission of the CADS Examination Board. Students then follow 10 ECTS of elective courses outside the CADS programme and may learn, for example, about Latin America, Europe, East Asia, or the Middle East. Students themselves are responsible for finding these alternative courses, in academic programmes at Leiden University or elsewhere. They are as well responsible for demanding in time the permission to attend them as well as for subscribing in time to these courses.
If a student wants to follow an alternative for the three Area Courses offered by CADS (Sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia and South Asia) it is strongly adviced to start with a search at the websites of the other four CADS programmes in the Netherlands, followed by exploring which area courses are offered by academic Humanities programmes.
Caveat: students should be aware that many courses aren’t available for external students. Therefore it is necessary to check carefully the admission criteria before registration is attempted. Admission criteria are published the Prospectus.
If an alternative to a CADS offered Area Course is attended at Leiden University, registration can take place in uSis. Students may follow courses at another university only if they meet that university’s registration requirements in time.
When choosing regional elective courses, Students should take into account the following:
the subject must cover a number of aspects of contemporary society in a region: economy, culture, history, political design, art ... students may therefore follow multiple courses on different themes within the same region.
a region is in principle broader than a nation state, but in some cases might also cover large nation states (think of Russia, China, the US ...)
language courses are not seen as regional modules, but may be followed in the third year as part of the free elective space
the regional elective courses must in principle have a level of 200, but a maximum of 5 ECTS at level 100 may be recognized. Higher levels are clearly satisfactory.
Students are advised to pre-submit their choice of courses to Board of Examiners as replacements for CADS regional modules. Such requests should be sent by submitting petitions in uSis (see the tabs for the 'Electives' where in this case the instruction for Situation 6 applies). The request should be provided with a motivation in which you describe at least how these courses fit into the area studies and the added value of these courses to your study programme.