1,453 departments in Turkish public universities do not employ professors

Duvar English

In Turkish public universities, there were no professors in 1,453 departments, including those of midwifery, nursing, law, and engineering.

As of Aug. 4, students completed their selection process for the universities. Students had options for more than 6,000 departments from 129 public universities, according to the official statistics from the country’s Student Selection and Placement Center (ÖSYM) reported by the daily BirGün.

Despite the Justice and Development Party’s (AKP) project to open universities in every province, one in every five departments did not employ professors. In 1,050 departments, there were no associate professors.

There has not been sufficient data for foundation universities.

Among the departments without professors, law stood out the most as six law faculties had no professors at all. This included Boğaziçi University, which opened last year and began accepting students despite all criticisms. The other faculties were at Afyon Kocatepe, Çankırı Karatekin, İnönü, İzmir Demokrasi, and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan universities.

There were no professors in more than 100 engineering departments. In computer engineering, one of the most preferred engineering departments, there were no professors in 35 universities. Many of them did not employ any associate professors.

There were also no professors in 37 of the 120 nursing departments and 28 of the 49 midwifery departments.

The education faculties have been on the agenda in Turkey due to their quotas despite the issue of unappointed teachers. Over 200 teaching departments have no professors. Particularly, in many universities, the number of professors in social studies teaching and special education teaching departments was zero.