Willem Flinterman (1984) studied history and Middle Eastern studies at the universities of Leiden and Amsterdam. He successfully completed a PhD programme at the latter university in 2017. He has taught at several universities and since 2015 works for Topscriptie B.V. as a freelance coach.
His area of expertise is wide. He gained extensive experience in tutoring BA and MA students in the humanities, including history, art history, language and culture studies, philosophy, and religion studies. In addition, he offers tutoring for subjects in the social sciences, such as political and policy sciences, conflict studies, and related disciplines.
Willem has agility in a wide range of research approaches and methods and is happy to help students apply these to their own work. He offers coaching in Dutch, English and German.
“During my academic career, I have gained experience in teaching and guiding students and I discovered that I really enjoy doing that. I noticed that self-diffidence forms one of the biggest obstacles during the writing process. Often, this problem cannot be properly addressed within the regular educational structures. When I coach someone, I see it as my first task to boast their self-confidence. It is helpful to identify the weaknesses, but it is especially important to indicate the strengths of one‘s work. As a student, it is important that regain a feeling of ownership over your own work. You don’t have to like it, but it is nice to be able to feel proud about it, when it’s done.”
