Sefik Umucu (seated fourth from right), the director of Indo-Turkish Educational Trust (West Bengal), with professor Indrani Kalkan (seated third from right), Turkish Cultural Centre officials and the various school principals and college professors. Picture: Arnab Mondal

On January 22, principals and head teachers of city schools had an interactive session with professor Indrani Kalkan of Mevlana University, Turkey, at the Turkish Cultural Centre (Shakespeare Sarani) to discover Turkey as an education destination.

“Turkey has the standards of the West and values of the East, it is like a gateway for both the sides,” said Kalkan, before she spoke about her university and the various courses on offer.

Mevlana University, set up in 2009 in Konya, has around 55 students from India. Courses are taught in English and there are plenty of scholarships for international students. Students can choose from four departments — Social Science, Science, Health Science and Educational Sciences.

“There are a number of reasons why today Turkey can be considered as a study option. The distance is half of US, they are offering lower fees to international students, the faculty is great and the science stream in Turkey is cutting-edge with a lot of stress on research,” said Sunirmal Chakravarthi, principal, La Martiniere for Boys, who along with the principals of St. James School and Saifee Hall visited Turkey a few months back.

“We are trying to connect the schools and students in the two countries,” said Imran Zaki, the president of Faces (Friends of Alumni/ae of Colleges, Educational Institutes and Schools), which is facilitating the process.

“We believe education is extremely important.... Apart from Mevlana, there are options like Sateh University and Zirve University,” said Mustafa Demir, counsellor of the Educational Endowment Trust at the Turkish Cultural Centre, Calcutta.

Time to consider Turkey as more than the land of whirling dervishes and architectural wonders, we say!

Sreyoshi Dey