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[witness]

nastiye

As I expected, more smoke and mirrors and a lot of words to say very little, if anything at all. 

I don't especially 'like' the universities I spoke positively of: Bilkent, Koc and Sabanci in the private sector and Bogazici and METU in the public sector, but I do know that they are good universities that would hold their own if measured in an international context.  I worked in one of those institutions and I can say on the basis of experience that it was, and no doubt still is a serious, ambitious and professionally run university.  I also worked in two of the 'lesser' instutions, and they were a very different proposition, characterized by behaviour on the part of senior staff that began with the unprofessional and ran the full gamut to utterly unethical, including among the lesser misdemeanours, routine behind the scenes changing of students' grades.  The problems begin with a lack of accountablilty and it's all downhill from there.

Your attempt to play the race card in an earlier post with your remark about 'soft racism' is lame and inappropriate.  Nothing that I, or indeed anyone else has written which has been critical of some institutions in Turkey has attempted to argue that there is something uniquely or intrinsically wrong with those institutions that results from something that could be defined as 'Turkish.'  Equally, your 'some of my best friends are Kurds, Armenians, etc.,' line is simply facetious.

To end, you were invited to say something positive about the Turkish university system, and there are positive things to say, but you have declined that invitation in favour of your usual cheap personal attacks.

[dqa9653]

I suggest that we put an end to the feud between nastiye and witness. It's counterproductive. I think that the honest approach would be to admit that the academic system in Turkey has a number of serious flaws. One such flaw (which is of most interest to the readers of this forum) has to do with the treatment of international staff which, even at Bilkent, is ambivalent: They are often paid more, but they are treated with suspicion and are expected to leave the university after a few years. They are seldom promoted or treated like an integral part of the system. As to whether this problem is esssentially Turkish or not: do we really care?

[witness]

dqa9653

Thanks for your contribution.  I agree that the 'feud' is unhelpful.  It seems to be over, given that Nastiye appears unwilling to engage in constructive dialogue.  Bilkent was the 'good' institution at which I worked.  No complaints.  My experience there was good.  As to your 'do we really care?' remark; well, no doubt many don't, but when I am incorrectly accused of racism, I care rather a lot to set the record straight.

[emigre]

Having taught in three universities in Turkey, all private or 'foundation' universities, I would like to endorse the points made above. Though Bosporus and ODTU/METU get the cream of the students, there are enough very good students at other places, notably Bilkent, to make the job worthwhile. Simple test to ask: how many "top hundred" students from the university entrance exam does your university get? But since Turkey has a very large population there are quite large numbers of students of reasonable ability elsewhere. The main problem is that as a foreigner you are teaching in English, and only a minority of undergraduate level students reach sufficient written fluency to do university level work. [That leads to widespread cheating, but I won't go into that.]
     Another problem for both students and staff is excessively long teaching hours. 12 hours teaching a week is usual and 15 is common at some places. On top of that they may expect staff to publish in cited journals while being in their offices and not libraries etc from 8.30 to 5.30 every week day. (In some places deans come round and check on this!) No wonder some international journal editors report a torrent of rubbish coming out of Turkey. Students may have 35 hours of classes a week and no time to read books. There is absolutely no discussion about this and how the best ones survive despite this always puzzled me. (They also like basic social rights -- e.g. freedom to have visitors etc in their dormitories -- and recreational facilities.)
     The basic problem with all the private universities is that they are absolutely undemocratic and have few if any mechanisms for consulting staff or indeed for respecting their rights. In fact they resist efforts at participation. This extends to deliberately not having any social facilities for foreign-hired staff: apparently fearing that they might swap ideas and unite if they could meet each other informally. They shop a la carte at the Western intellectual menu -- and leave intellectual freedom and individual rights off the list. Hence the highly autocratic system.Foreign instructors do as they are told. They get one year renewable contacts no matter no long they stay. Deans on the other hand (and they would never be foreigners) are treated like demi-gods with vast offices, cars etc. Jobs and functions may be held in plurality with the real work (including writing) being done by their underlings. I have known cases where even foreigners were supposed to ghost work for their superiors. Promotion is an other issue: basically it is only for locals and by no means for all of them either. You have to be favoured person in a favoured faculty. (The correspondent above who invoked orientalism and racism, though she does make some genuinely valid points, exemplifies the tone which sets in when relations become difficult.)
      Despite the above, I enjoyed teaching in Turkey and a lot of campus life: able students and excellent colleagues and friends. Good luck to them all. In a more rational and democratic climate, with greater emphasis on real academic quality rather than ascribed status, teaching in Turkey could be a wonderful experience. But the trends are towards more economy, more centralisation, and unfortunately towards greater hold of certain religious groups in a previously secular environment. Most of the newest universities are thought to have unseen religious affiliations.
      All these points should be more widely known as there is discussion of bringing very much larger numbers of foreigners into Turkish higher education.

[emigre]

Oh, and I should have added: in some places at least, salaries are not always paid on time. The newly arrived foreigner who has not yet received his/her workpermit, and is therefore in theory being employed illegally, is particularly vulnerable. Always get all contract details clearly stated in advance, including moving expense details etc, written down, keep them safely, and have them ready to produce when necessary. Insist in advance on full help with visa and work permit formalities, remember that the bureaucratic formalities are, when handled properly, not all that onerous at all. And if your pay does not arrive, make a polite but firm fuss immediately.