The Campus Gate

I always used to have a gate when I went to any kind of schools and university.

Schools just somehow always needed to be gated from my point of view back in the day. I have never questioned its existence, but always consider it as an essential part of our school years. To describe the school gate is even a “classic” exercise in Vietnamese class for all students in primary school, of which the ending sentences are always like: “over years, classes after classes graduate and leave. The school gate is still there, welcoming new students. For all of us, it is not only a normal gate, but a part of the best memory in our school years”.

I meant it when I wrote so.

However, university of Passau – and I bet many other universities in Europe would share the same trait – is an open campus. There is absolutely no gate, or at least no “main” one that marks the “border of knowledge”. Instead, my university is an open space made of many buildings along the Inn, where students can easily have a vacation just by looking out of the windows, or having a park to hang out just by taking few steps outside.

Like already mentioned in many previous blogs of mine, there is hardly any other word I can use to describe more about my city or my university. Though, when there is no gate, what would be the “witness” of generations of students and theirs uni years according to my primary school way of thinking? In other word, do I feel like there is something missing when I go to the campus?

The answer is no. Instead, the interpretations of “knowledge has no border”, or “university brings you to the outside world” get me really excited and proud being a student here in Germany. The city is the campus, and the campus blends into the city and into our very own “university area” in everyone’s heart.

An open space symbolises open minds, where there is no limit for knowledge and explorations.

There is no campus gate. Hence, everyone is welcome to come, to stay, and to open their own gate of the heart, the mind and the future.