Nuffic was founded on 11 January 1952 by the president curators of the existing Dutch universities. The goal was primarily to organise English education for students from developing countries that had recently gained independence. For this purpose the Institute of Social Studies (ISS) was established, initially as part of Nuffic, but it became an independent institute in 1956. This is where the current role of Nuffic in
development cooperation – management of scholarship programmes and institutional cooperation programmes – finds its roots. The first official president was
Prince Bernard of the Netherlands, who remained in that position for two years. After
Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands moved to
Het Loo Palace, Nuffic relocated to
Noordeinde Palace until 1977. Currently, Nuffic is situated in another famous building in The Hague: the former headquarters of the PTT (Post, Telegraph, Telephone), an organisation that used to be state owned, on the Kortenaerkade. The building is a national monument. Over the years Nuffic acquired a great number of other tasks. Since 1958 the organisation is involved in the recognition of international diplomas and making comparisons of education systems. Its efforts to support educational cooperation in Europe increased during the 1980s. At that time both The Hague and Brussels set up stimulation programmes, among which the
Erasmus Programme. Marco Schouten has been the Director-General of Nuffic since August 2025. From August 2021 till december 2024 Titia Bredée took up this position. She succeeds Freddy Weima, who left Nuffic in April 2021 to become chairman of the Dutch Association of Primary Schools (PO-Raad). Weima succeeded Sander van den Eijnden, who left Nuffic in the spring of 2012 to become President of the executive board of the
Open University of the Netherlands. In 2015 Nuffic merged with Europees Platform. ==External links==