Design & Research 2 | For: Birgit Bachler
How I Became a ‘Security Threat‘ Just Trying to Study Design
Let’s suppose you just graduated from your Bachelor’s program and you are planning to go outside of your country for higher studies. You look around on the internet, figure out exactly what you want to do, and find a university that teaches exactly what you want to study. You decide to apply, you get your admission, and you get ready to move to a new country and meet new people. Sounds incredibly smooth right?
Well there is a catch. If you want to study in Europe as a non EU student, and especially if you are from a third world country, I really wish it was that smooth.
A Year of Paperwork
Let me take you through my personal journey. After doing my Exchange Semster here, I saw exactly what I wanted to pursue. I decided to apply for my Master’s in Interaction Design at FH JOANNEUM because I believed it was the right decision. But just coming to Austria meant going through a year long process. For some people it takes even longer than a year.
First I had to get all my documents attested by local courts in Pakistan. Then I had to get them attested again by every single authority that originally issued them. Then they had to be stamped by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. After waiting four to five months, you finally get an appointment at VFS Global just to have the Austrian embassy legalize your documents to prove they are not fake. Once that is done, you try to get an appointment at the embassy to actually apply for your permit. That part is a total nightmare in itself.
After you finally submit your application, you have absolutely no clue what is happening or what is going on behind the scenes. Then suddenly, I got an email from the Magistrate in Graz. They told me I needed to submit my police clearance certificate, fully legalized by the Austrian embassy, because they suspected my current one was fake. And they gave me exactly 14 days to do it.
I wish I had known this beforehand so I could have legalized that document early. But I did not know because there is no proper channel or guide available to tell you these things. It was physically impossible to make it happen in 14 days. I emailed the embassy four times and could not get a response. I even showed the Magistrate my emails, asking for more time and showing that I was trying my absolute best to cooperate.
Their response? The Magistrate rejected my residence application. In their official rejection document, they literally used the term that I was a “security threat to Austria.”
Me. A design student. A security threat.
Going to Court to Study Design
I had to file an appeal in court in Graz against this decision. According to Austrian law, they cannot reject your application for being unwilling to cooperate or call you a security threat just because things are out of your hands when you are trying your best. The case went to court, and thank god I won. They granted me my residence permit.
Because of all this chaos, I was a month and a half late to start my studies. I was so stressed that I almost emailed the university to ask for a refund on my fee because I thought I might not be able to make it anymore even after that much effort.
And just so you know, this was my experience as someone who actually has an Austrian embassy in their home country. Just imagine what happens to students from Bangladesh. They do not even have an embassy in their country and have to travel to a completely different country like India just to get their documents checked.
How Do We Fix This Broken System? This whole experience is exactly why I moved to this topic. The system is fundamentally broken. It places a massive emotional weight and cognitive load on students before they even step foot in a classroom.
I want to see if there is any way to fix this problem and figure out what the best way to do it would be. For my next steps, I am exploring the world of service design to see how we can make this journey more humane and transparent. I tried making a prototyping idea of an online portal and a digital status tracker that might actually solve this issue. I recently tested it with my class fellows and colleagues, and I will tell you all about their feedback in my next post.
