Turkey: Courses canceled in university, professors asked to clear out offices

Courses by 16 professors were vetoed by the administration of Istanbul's Bogazici University weeks to the beginning of the new term.

A professor at the Industrial Engineering Department told Turkish daily Cumhuriyet that the professors who were to give the courses have been asked by the administration to clear out their offices.

Noting that the courses were vetoed although they had earlier been approved by the boards of the faculties, professor Tinaz Ekim Asici said:

"While they launch disciplinary proceedings on unfounded allegations and try to intimidate and silence the academicians, they send away distinguished professors both from the classroom and from the university campus. The lawyers are positive that the professors will win in court if they file charges, but it takes too much time. Now that they totally control the university board and senate. they are rapidly liquidating Bogazici University and placing their own teams through appointments."

Among the professors who the university administration called to leave the premises are Alpar Sevgen, a physics professor with MS and Ph.D from Yale University and a former dean of the Engineering Faculty, Izzettin Onder, a prominent economist, Faruk Birtek, a prominent sociologist with Ph.D fom the University of California at Berkeley. Birtek was among the few in early 1980s who defied the rector's instructions and refused to shave off his beard, after the military administration following the 12 September 1980 coup called on all university professors to be clean-shaven.

The university administration has been publishing job advertisements that express arbitrary limitations and preferences in order to employ specific individuals, a physics lecturer told Diken on Wednesday.

Kaan Ozturk underlined that such advertisements were not approved by the departments and were published on the instructions of the administration.

Bogazici University's current rector Naci Inci was appointed by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in July 2021 despite strong reactions by academicians and students.