Industrial partnerships

PARTNERSHIP WITH KNOWLEDGE DEVELOPMENT CENTRE MAINPORT SCHIPHOL

The Aviation Academy is a long-term partner within the Centre of Excellence of the Knowledge and Development Centre (KDC) Mainport Schiphol. In the KDC the Dutch aviation partners KLM, Amsterdam Airport Schiphol and Air Traffic Control the Netherlands (LVNL) work together with universities and other research institutes to innovate the Schiphol operation.

Within the KDC, the Aviation Academy contributes to the subject 'Capacity Management'. Capacity Management deals with the capacity of the airport’s processes, limited resources (for example, runways, taxiways, airspace, gates or terminal) as well as with capacity constraints that arise when various stakeholders converge on the limited space on the airport. Capacity management is of critical importance in ensuring that the operations run smoothly.

Each year, 10 students and Aviation Academy staff jointly work at Schiphol Airport to innovate the Schiphol operation with respect to Capacity. Each new group of students builds on the results of the research of the previous group of students. All student projects are defined by multiple stakeholders at Schiphol Airport, thereby ensuring a sector wide approach of each of the research projects.

While students typically work for 5 months within the KDC – for the duration of their final BSc thesis – our assistant professor Frenchez Pietersz is involved long term. Long term involvement ensures continuous high level student supervision, integration of results from student projects into continuous research lines, and overall conclusions and recommendations.

The research of students and staff within KDC is part of the lectoraat Aviation Management, headed by professor Geert Boosten. Results of this research are continuously fed back into our regular Bachelor curriculum, in order to ensure the best possible connection of our curriculum to the current challenges and developments within industry.

For more information about the student projects and Aviation Academy involvement in KDC CoE please click here.