Today the clothing no longer fits the body for higher education  
Today the clothing no longer fits the body for higher education

Today the clothing no longer fits the body for higher education

Minister of National Education Nabi Avcı says “it is impossible to achieve our goals in the higher education system with a structure that has lost its consistency.”

Today the clothing no longer fits the body for higher education

Minister of National Education Nabi Avcı addressed a panel at the conference center of the Yaşar University in the Aegean provincial capital city of İzmir titled “The Place and Importance of İzmir in the Future of Turkish Higher Education.”

Minister Avcı said the current higher education system is the product of the 1980 military coup and was designed for the 27 state universities that existed then.

 

“This dress is too tight for the body”

Minister Avcı said today there are nearly about 200 universities in Turkey, that universities are different qualitative wise, and that the higher education system is inadequate in coping with and managing the changes in higher education adding “in fact those who have been involved in this right from the start confess that the current system no longer fits the body both qualitative wise and quantitative wise.”

Saying there is a variety of universities Minister Avcı went on to say “among the state universities we have old universities that have institutional culture. Then we have the middle aged universities that have not completely established their institutional culture and that are barely standing on their two feet while we also have universities that have not been able to establish their institutional cultures and thus rely on the protection and interference of the center. We have the universities established by foundations and they too differ among themselves. On the one hand we have universities that have been established on the assets of foundations which are truly universities of foundations and then you have universities that were to be private universities but as the Constitution does not permit the inauguration of such universities they pretend to be universities set up by foundations and want to become private when they get the chance. In those days (after the 1980 coup) the system may have had a consistency and viability yet today it has completely lost its consistency with various changes in the regulations. It is impossible to achieve our goals in the higher education system with a structure that has lost its consistency.”

 

A framework law that has not been pinned down with Constitutional sanctions

Minister Avcı said what is needed is a flexible framework law that will allow each university to create its own management model consistent with the special needs of the university and added “we could not change the Constitution during the current term. If we can altogether write a new Constitution which does not tie down the higher education system with stringent clauses and allows a higher education law that creates a flexible framework allowing each university to create its own administrative model according to its own needs, special cases, goals, strategies and that can be changed in the course of time according to emerging needs and conditions.”    

 

A law that is special to the institutional culture of university

Saying practically all the universities and nongovernmental organizations have drawn up their own alternative drafts for a new higher education law Minister Avcı said:

“The members of a well-established university came to me with a draft legislation they had prepared during the days when I was first appointed as minister. It was a good document. As like many of our Turkish intellectuals you want to shape everything yourselves. You have brought us such a draft legislation proposal that will apply to the Şırnak University, the Konya Seljuk University, the Istanbul Technical University and the Sabancı University. Whereas I would have expected you to come to me and say as the Education Minister do not interfere in our affairs. We are a well-established university with deep roots. We have our own traditional institutional culture and a university that cannot be compared to any other university in Turkey. This is how we want to run our university. We do not care what others do. However, we do not want you or any others to try to fit a dress on us and draw up a framework for us as we have a history and traditions. We want a law that we have drawn up for ourselves.”

 

Three models pricy to the Turkish education system

Minister Avcı said there are three unique models special to Turkey, two of which have failed and the third which is currently being used. 

One he said was the village institutes and the other was the state colleges. He said the village institutes effort was a well thought model but became redundant in time while the state colleges set up in 1956 were later turned into Anatolian high schools and then their numbers were increased and they became degenerate.

 

“The quantitative scales for İmam Hatip High Schools should be properly balanced”

Minister Avcı said the third unique for Turkey is the Imam Hatip High Schools (schools that raise imams and Islamic preachers) model that is still being applied and said “that model too is faced with the threat of being degenerated if its quantitative scales are not properly balanced as have been the case for the degeneration of the village institutes and the state colleges. It is a model very special for Turkey and if today certain extremist currents have not found breeding ground in Turkey it is because of these high schools which are an original Turkish experiment.”

 

“Universities should raise their own students from secondary schools”

Minister Avcı said the universities set up by foundations in a way can be called the fourth trial to establish a model and said a relationship similar to the one between the Galatasaray High School and the Galatasaray University can be established and proposed that universities should raise their own students from their own secondary and high schools.

Minister Avcı said this could be a remedy for the complaints of the universities that high schools are not providing them with students up to the standards they require and added “as the word goes the Yaşar University and the Katip Çelebi University could set up secondary and high schools to raise their own students. So the students who graduate from your own high schools can enter your university without any entrance exam just like the case of the Galatasaray High School and the Galatasaray University. This way the students will be much better equipped for the undergraduate and graduate courses at Yaşar University.”

The minister said the Ministry is prepared to extend all the necessary help in this area and at the end of his speech advised students who are currently being educated in İzmir or who will be going to schools in İzmir to read Ahmet Sipahioğlu’s book Tepeli Taklak.

Prof. Dr. Galip Akhan, the term president of the İzmir Universities Platform and Rector of the İzmir Katip Çelebi University briefed the panel about the efforts of the platform. Yaşar University Rector Prof. Dr. Murat Berkan made a presentation titled “International University Cities.”

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