12.12.2018 Ankara
TOBB Turkey Higher Education Council meeting, hosted by TOBB ETU Board of Trustees Chairman and TOBB President M. Rifat Hisarcıklıoğlu, with the attendance of HEC Chairman Prof. Dr. Yekta Saraç at the TOBB Union Center Social Facilities Meeting Hall in Ankara.
Rifat
Hisarcıklıoğlu, in his speech, stated that special emphasis should be placed on
combining theoretical education with practical training, “We must promote joint
education programs in our universities.”
Hisarcıklıoğlu
pointed out the importance of education and said that the share of higher
education cannot be denied in acquiring a profession, skills and in creating a
vision for the future. Reporting that there are 5 Turkish universities in the
first 500 universities in the world, indicating that 3 of them are foundation
universities, Hisarcıklıoğlu said:
“In
terms of academic competitiveness in higher education, we pay particular attention
to foundation universities. Foundation universities decrease inequality in
education and offer equal opportunities.”
Hisarcıklıoğlu
stated that they favor a reassessment of university quotas according to the
needs of the business world and added that, “Because every vacant quota is
wastes the resources of our country.”
Hisarcıklıoğlu
emphasized that vocational high schools should be renewed in order to train
qualified intermediate staff:
“We
have to give special attention to combining with practical training to theoretical
training. We absolutely need to promote joint training programs at our
universities. As academics, students, alumni and business representatives,
universities must become open centers for innovation. In order to bring about a
richer, more prosperous Turkey, we need more entrepreneurs. Universities are
the best platform to ensure this. For that reason, technocities, technoparks,
incubation centers and technology transfer offices under universities are very
important.”
- Higher Education Council Chairman
Chairman
of the Council of Higher Education (HEC, YÖK) Dr. Yekta Sarac, noting that the number
of higher education students exceeded 8 million in Turkey, said, “That number
is twice that of Germany and we’ve exceeded the number of higher education
students in Russia.”
Sarac
pointed out that the while, positive aspects for this many higher education
students are apparent, without proper direction, it can have detrimental
effects.
Stating
that approximately 19% of the total quotas in higher education institutions are
fulfilled by foundation universities, Sarac said, “Of these, 20% are registered
in associate programs while the rest are undergraduate programs.”
Regarding
the supervision of foundation higher education institutions, Saraç said, “There
may be a special law, but in any case, foundation higher education institutions
should be audited financially, just as YÖK is supervised.
Yekta
Sarac said, “Our students have become selective, making conscious choices. This
is gratifying. This is the first point which will be instrumental in increasing
quality.”
The
meeting continued on closed to the press; representatives of the foundation
universities presented their assessments on the higher education system to the
Higher Education Council Chairman.