Republic of turkey

Approaches to the training of academic staff

In these days where the capacities of higher education should be developed immediately, the main objective is the creation of a sufficient programme for the training of academic staff. Success will depend on the investment made to the improvement of human factor rather than on the investments to be made for the physical infrastructure.

There are not sufficient data on the number of people on average benefit from the master’s and doctorate programmes in Turkey. Table 38 is created in the light of the existing data. The first institution that send students abroad for Master’s and Doctorate level studies is the Ministry of National Education (MoNE). MoNE has sent 1755 students abroad within the period of 1994-2005 on the basis of the law numbered 1416.⁵⁶ The sufficiency level of this programme showed only to be 52%. This is a very low level. Supposing that some of those who receive master’s degree fail in doctorate, the level of sufficiency will even be lower. The authorities of MoNE has stated in a questionnaire (survey) that this programme has shown only an average success. It is also understood in the research that the main determining factor of students’ failure is the lack of (foreign) language knowledge.⁵⁷

The second programme of Turkey aiming at improving well-qualified manpower abroad is the research assistants sent abroad by the Council of Higher Education on the basis of the 33^rd article of the law numbered 2547. There have been efforts made to send research assistants abroad for postgraduate education as well as to improve postgraduate programmes at home in order to make up for the lack of academic staff in universities. Within the period of 1987-2005, the Council of Higher Education sent 3776 research assistants to 29 different countries for postgraduate education. Approximately 50% of those research assistants were sent to USA, 38% to England, and 12% to 27 different countries.

Table 38: Those Who Benefited from Master’s and Doctorate Programmes Abroad

Institution	Legal Basis	Period	The number of those supported	Completed	Continuing	Success %
MoNE	1416	1994 -2005	1755	357 Doctorates 340 Master’s	362	52,42
Council of Higher Education	2547Md.33	1987-2005	3776	1777 Doctorates 376 Master’s Y.Lisans	712	70,26
Scientific and Technical Research Council of Turkey	NATO-A.1	1986-2005	918
	Integrated	1995-2005	238	178	58
Turkish Academy of Sciences	Integrated	1995-2005	157	116 Doctorates*	24	87,21

Source: TÜBA (Turkish Academy of Sciences) Türkiye’de Doktora eğitiminin Durumu Üzerine Görüşler (Views on Doctoral Study in Turkey) 2006.

* 12 of those students accomplished their education through scholarships that they received from other sources.

2153 research assistants of 3776 who were sent abroad completed their studies and returned to Turkey. 376 of those research assistants received Master’s degree, 1164 Doctorate degree, and 613 Master’s and Doctorate degree abroad. The number of research assistants who could not complete their education for failure, health and other reasons is 353. The number of those who did not return (those resigned) is 558, and the rest, 712 research assistants continue their education abroad.

With this programme, 209 students per year are sent abroad and the success in providing universities with lecturers is 70% on average. It is obvious that the programme of the Council of Higher Education is more efficient when compared to the programme of MoNE. Due to cadre limitations since 2004, students with research assistant status have not been sent abroad by the Council of Higher Education for Master’s and Doctorate level studies.

In the third row of Table 83 the numbers of students sent abroad by The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey between 1968-2001 within the framework of NATO are shown. The success rate of this programme is not known. During last year, the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey has increased the number of scholarships within another framework of a programme that it offers since 1995. In 2006, 643 students were offered scholarships for Master’s and Doctorate, 102 of which to be on basic sciences and pedagogic, 414 on engineering and architecture, 108 on social sciences and 16 on health sciences. Those who are enrolled in a Master’s programme are offered 1250 YTL, and those enrolled in a doctoral programme receive 1500 YTL per month.⁵⁸

It is possible to say that the total amount of students sent by MoNE and the Council of Higher Education is 370 on average; only 226 of them achieved the expected result. According to the data of MoNE, the number of those who continue their doctoral education abroad with their own resources is 1553. 1047 of those receive education on sciences, 505 on social sciences. When it is considered that the doctoral education lasts four years, the overall number of those who go abroad on their own resources per year is approximately 390.

Those who receive education abroad have a cost of 30.000$ per year for the government. However, a student has a cost of 3.000$ per year in the country. In other words, doctorate study abroad costs almost ten times more than the doctorate study at home. For this reason, Turkey is searching for ways to develop human capital with high qualifications. The first way to achieve this is the “Integrated PhD Programme” which is implemented by the Turkish Academy of Sciences. Within this programme, a student receives his/her doctoral programme basically in Turkey. Besides, pursues his/her studies in a university abroad approximately for one year by receiving help from an advisor there and finishes his/her doctorate when returned to Turkey. In this programme, the student both establishes new academic relationships and reduces the possibility of remaining abroad. As a matter of fact, the success rate in this programme reaches to a high level of 87.5%.

The second way is the program by which the research assistants of developing universities benefit from developed universities for their doctoral education. Within the framework of 35^th article of law numbered 2547, research assistants of developing universities were assigned tasks in developed universities. 3340 research assistants still continue their education within this framework. All those figures are still poor when Turkey’s needs are regarded.

The limitation that the universities encounter in training academic staff does not solely depend on the capacities of the concerning institutions. Another one is the limitation set by the government on the number of research assistants’. In recent years, there has been a great difficulty in receiving the permission to use staff of this group, which is the source of academic staff. Within the Budget Law of 2006, there is also an unfavourable decree that supports it. Total number of research assistants in state universities is 20.736 by the end of 2005, while 20.650 in 2002. Within the same period of time, even though there was an increase of 22% in the number of students in those universities, the increase in the number of research assistants was only of 0,4%.

The success of higher education systems depends on the qualifications of academic staff at a great extent. One of the most significant criteria of a university’s success is to train qualified new academic staff. Within this respect, the most critical criteria in academic life are the numbers offered concerning the doctorate. In this regard, the performance of universities is noted to be limited. One doctoral degree and (plus) one medical specialization degree are offered per 11 academic staff. The main bottleneck for not being able to increase this number is the lack of funds needed by the doctorate students to live on. As the number of research assistants cannot be increased, the number of applications for doctorate study decreases, therefore, the number of doctorate graduates cannot be raised.

The low number of doctorate receivers is not the only problem for Turkey. According to the report of the Turkish Academy of Science,⁵⁹ there are significant differences among the qualities of completed doctorates. The most important variable that determines the quality of a doctorate is the scientific level of doctorate advisors and whether they spend sufficient time or not in this respect.