Our Arts and Social Sciences Faculty Member Abdurrahman Aydemir’s article titled “Skill-based immigration, economic integration, and economic performance” is listed among today’s featured article for the IZA World of Labor.  

Please click to read the article.  

Sabancı University Faculty of Engineering an Natural Sciences member Yasemin Şengül Tezel will serve as the editor in the Elsevier journal “Applications in Engineering Science”. 

Applications in Engineering Science, which is an Elsevier journal, accepts a broad spectrum of contributions in engineering sciences and its applied aspects while its core interest lies in material modelling and response.

The journal where Şengül Tezel joins the editorial board of the journal consisting of world-known mathematicians and engineers especially encourages interdisciplinary studies.

As a result of her doctorate studies at the University of Oxford and research areas she has been interested in afterwards, Şengül Tezel has many contributions in the subjects within the scope of the journal including modelling and mathematical analysis of viscoelastic materials. Her review articles on nonlinear viscoelasticity of strain-rate type and strain-limiting viscoelasticity, which has been published in high-ranked journals recently, allowed her to become a leading expert on such fields.

Applications in Engineering Science Journal

For further information about the Applications in Engineering Science Journal please click.

"Workshop on the technological advancements in cement additives for renewable and sustainable thermal energy storage" will be held between 9:30 and 12:30 on January 12, 2021 and hosted by Sabancı University and under the chairmanship of SU IMC Researcher Burcu Saner Okan.

In the workshop, the outputs of the GEOCOND project (https://geocond-project.eu) carried out within the scope of Horizon 2020, where Saner Okan is a principal investigator from Turkey’s side and the faculty member of Yusuf Menceloglu is a researcher, will be presented. 

In the workshop program, the project partners from Çimsa and Carmel Olefins (Israel) will make presentations and Pınar Mengüç from Ozyegin University, Director of Centre for Energy, Environment and Economy, will be an invited speaker with his talk entitled as “Energy Efficiency as a Transdisciplinary Concept: Research and Applications”. 

Please click for the workshop program and to register.

The Purple Certificate Program, which has been conducted within SU Gender for 13 years, was held online for the first time this year.A total of 57 teachers and faculty of education students from 28 different cities participated in the training held between 17-22 August 2020.

Organizing one-week training programs spread over a year with the purpose of disseminating awareness related to gender equality in formal education, preparing supportive curriculum materials sensitive to gender equality, and carrying out dissemination activities by visiting cities in different regions of Turkey, the Purple Certificate Program is currently performing many of its activities online due to the pandemic conditions.

In this context, teachers and prospective teachers actively participated in the one-week online training program organized between 17-22 August 2020. In order to facilitate the participation in the program and reduce screen fatigue, various participant-centered and art-based activities were also carried out during the program. The most important advantage of organizing the program online was the significantly increase in the access of disabled participants and convenient participation in the program especially for people who have not previously applied for the program as they have home care obligations. Participants who had difficulties with access to the internet and a computer were offered financial support for access to these tools.

SU Gender's message:

“The issue of expanding access to both online and face-to-face studies, which became a more concrete agenda item during the pandemic period, will now be an indispensable part of the Purple Certificate Program’s agenda. We welcome all teachers to the online Purple Certificate on 16-20 November 2020. 

Want to meet the Purple Certificate Program?

Hülya Adak is the Director of SU Gender and an associate professor at Sabancı University's Doctoral Program in Cultural Studies and Gender Studies. Having completed her master's and doctoral studies in Comparative Literature at the University of Chicago, Hülya Adak develops the training programs of SU Gender and works on collaborations with with Sabancı University’s Executive Development Unit and international gender studies centers as well as online training. Adak, who also focuses on Sexual Harassment and Gender-based Violence during the COVID-19 period, organizes international webinars on these issues with researchers from SU Gender and works on joint publications, research, and action plans. Having won Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, British Academy (Newton), COST (Horizon 2020), and Marie Curie Supervisor awards in the fields of Gender and Women's Studies, Adak has been a professor at the Free University of Berlin since 2018. She also has many publications in the fields of literature, history, theater, memory studies, trauma studies, gender, and women's studies. For some of her publications, see: https://sabanciuniv.academia.edu/H%C3%BClyaAdak

Ceyda Karadaş received her bachelor's degree in International Relations from Ege University and her master's degree in Gender and Women's Studies from Middle East Technical University with her thesis on the Beauty Perceptions of Women Before and After Plastic Surgery. Since 2018, she has been the Purple Certificate Project Coordinator at Sabancı University Gender and Women's Studies Center of Excellence. Her interests include gender, education, and beauty perception. Ceyda Karadaş lives in Kadıköy with her two cats.

Born in Istanbul in 1991, Nazlı Hazar graduated from the Sociology Department of Bahçeşehir University in 2015 with her thesis entitled “Jewish Representations in 30’s and 40’s: The Case of Akbaba Magazine.” In 2016, she completed her second major in Political Science and International Relations at Bahçeşehir University. She finished her master’s studies at the Cultural Studies Department, Sabancı University in 2020 with her thesis entitled “Silent Memories: Yazidi Women in Turkey.” In 2019, she started working as a Purple Certificate Project Specialist at Sabancı University Gender and Women's Studies Center of Excellence. Her interests include gender, oral history, ethnography, memory, ethnicity, violence, and resistance.

İlayda Ece Ova

She completed her undergraduate studies at the Department of International Relations, Bilkent University. She completed her master's degree in Sociology and Social Anthropology at Central European University with a dissertation on the cultural production of migration movements. She joined SU Gender in 2018 after her experience working in a non-governmental organization focusing on refugees. In addition to the Purple Certificate Program, she works on Curious Steps and GEARING-Roles projects.

Emirhan Deniz Çelebi

TÜSİAD - Sabancı University Competition Forum (REF) held the second of its conference series on the Turkish economy and sector policies. At the second conference of the series, company dynamics and new employment creation in Turkey were discussed. 

Bahadır Balkır, Vice Chairman of TÜSİAD Board of Directors and Chairman of Industrial Policies Round Table, delivered the opening speech of the conference.  

Discussing the topic of employment with its various dimensions together with the the Fourth Industrial Revolution and with its increasing economic and social significance in the Covid-19 period, Bahadır Balkır highlighted in his speech that they are aware of the growing interest in the employment dynamics in both developed and developing countries and the impact of employment dynamics on employment stands out as a quite remarkable topic in both the academic literature and in practice. 

After the opening speech, a panel was held where Prof. Dr. Ümit Özlale and Dr. Beyza Polat presented their work entitled “Understanding Company Dynamics and Employment Creation in Turkey " and Prof. Dr. Haluk Levent evaluated the effects of company dynamics on employment creation. 

It was stated in the panel moderated by Esra Durceylan Kaygusuz, the Director of TÜSİAD-Sabancı University Competitiveness Forum and a faculty member at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS) that there are fundamental structural problems related to employment: high exit rate from workforce, skill mismatch, brain drain, and impact of early deindustrialization, employment capacity of the industry, and refugees on the labor market. It was noted that public support is scale-driven at companies and this needs to be reviewed. It was especially emphasized that newly established small-scale companies in Turkey create a large part of the employment, and that these companies fall down before they can grow as they age. The importance of conducting analysis in Turkey on a regional basis and the implementing different policies in each region was also highlighted. 

In addition, the panel evaluated the impact of the Covid-19 on the employment dynamics in our country, and emphasized that the labor problem has begun earlier than this period, and progressed even further.

You can watch the recording of the event below.

The projects of Ayşe Ozil, a faculty member at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS), and Burak Kocuk, a faculty member at the Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences (FENS), were found eligible to receive support under the TÜBİTAK 1002 program. 

Ayşe Ozil's project, which was found eligible to receive TÜBİTAK 1002 funding, is entitled “Evaluation of commercial buildings in the dock region of Galata between 1850 and 1950 in terms of economy, society, and human relations." 

Ayşe Ozil aims to investigate the history of Galata’s dock region, which has undergone a major transformation with Galataport. 

The project, which will investigate the commercial buildings in Galata from the last century of the Ottoman Empire to the first period of the Republic, and the companies that continued their international trade activities in these buildings, will shed light on important social and economic transformation points in Turkey's recent history. One of the most important outcomes of the project, which aims to reveal the commercial building space, organizational structure and social background of the commercial buildings as one of the main building blocks of the city’s economy during the period under review, will be an exhibition consisting of original collection items related to the commercial buildings of Galata. 

Burak Kocuk's project, which was found eligible to receive TÜBİTAK 1002 funding, is entitled “Discretization-based Solution Approaches to The Strap Packaging Problem.” 

The project led by Burak Kocuk aims to develop discretization-based optimization approaches to the strap packaging problem encountered in many different application areas and is quite challenging to solve. A graduate scholar will also be involved in this project. 

Melsa Ararat, the Director of Corporate Governance Forum at Sabancı University, spoke at the LEAD Network Turkey CEO event and clarified the problems regarding women's participation in company management.

Ararat shared the current data and said: “According to a study we have just completed, the number of female CEOs in publicly traded companies in Turkey is 16 in 2020. In other words, 3% of all publicly traded companies has a female CEO.  While the ratio of women in boards of directors is 17%, such a low ratio of female CEOs is not unique to Turkey. This tells us that while women have been able to access board positions as a result of investor and stakeholder pressure, there is no or very slow progress in executive positions. However, those who determine the future of companies, their strategic orientation, and the purpose of their activities, that is, those who define the essence of the company's relationship with markets, society, and stakeholders are CEOs and their team."

Referring to studies on the impact of the pandemic on women's working and private lives, Ararat said that women undertook increasing housework much more than men and thus displayed more physical and psychological stress symptoms during this period of working from home. She noted that, according to another study that they conducted, women experienced a significant increase in the rate of all kinds of pressure and violence inflicted by men with whom they had close relationships during the pandemic. Ararat said: “Although many international studies demonstrate that working from home increases productivity and in some cases innovation, it should be kept in mind to enable women to participate more effectively in working life that, in some cases, the workplace may be the safest environment for women, where they are most valued and supported.”

The basis of the round table meeting of the LEAD Network CEO event was the question of “How do we fix the career pipeline where the number of women decreases with every step?” Ararat listed other questions that need to be discovered as follows: “How do we prevent segregation of jobs based on gender and eliminate our conscious or unconscious biases in hiring and promotion? How do we encourage working women under double burden to set higher goals for themselves? If it is not possible to creating change without setting goals and determining appropriate policies and methods, how do we ensure that these goals are bold and owning at the top level?”

Aysun Zaman, Chair of the LEAD Network Turkey, gave the opening speech in the event held on 22 September 2020, Tuesday and said: “We have to do something together. The women’s unemployment rate has reached 32%, the wage gap between men and women doing the same job is 16%, and women can only earn 84% of men's earnings despite doing the same job.” It was noted in the event that it is predicted that women will decide on how to spend and manage 75% of the family budget by 2028, excluding the essential household expenditures.

The participants of the event included CEOs of significant companies in the industry such as the LEAD Network Turkey’s corporate members CEO of A101 Erhan Bostan, CEO of Arzum Mete Zadil, General Manager of Atasun Optik Nihat Aydın, General Manager of AVON Turkey and North Africa & Middle East Orkun Gül, General Manager of Barilla Piero Mirra, General Manager of Barry Callebaut Turkey Neslihan Nigiz Ulak, CEO of Coca-Cola Burak Başarır, CEO of Dydo Drinco Turkey & Russia & UK Tadashi Sakashita, General Manager of GSK Turkey Özlem Kaynak, General Manager of HARIBO Hakan Zor, General Manager of Henkel Turkey Güray Yıldız, General Manager of Lila Group Alp Öğücü, Founding Partner of KOTON Gülden Yilmaz, CEO of Media Markt Yenal Gökyıldırım, CEO of Migros Özgür Tort, CEO of Nestlé Turkey Ansgar Borneman, Senior Vice President of Nielsen Analytic Consulting Didem Şekerel Erdoğan, General Manager of NIVEA Beiersdorf Turkey Mustafa Birhan Hazer, General Manager of PepsiCo Ece Aksel, General Manager of Pernod Ricard Selçuk Tümay, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Procter & Gamble Tankuter Turnaoğlu, General Manager of Reckitt Benckiser Turkey Abhishek Chuckarbutty, General Manager of RB Iberia Selim Akiş, General Manager of Tchibo Turkey Tuba Yapıncak, General Manager of Teknosa Bülent Gürcan, CEO of UNO Evin Pehlivanlı, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Unilever Mustafa Seçkin.

To celebrate the 20th year of our university, we have prepared a set of four questions to ask faculty and administrative personnel who have been with us since the beginning, and to our first students. They all tell "the story of 20 years" from their own perspectives.

Going in alphabetical order, this week's interviewee for "The Story of 20 Years" is Zeynep Bahar Çelik.

Zeynep Bahar Çelik has been a member of the Sabancı University family for 21 years. She is one of the first 249 undergraduate students of 1999, when the university opened its doors. Having graduated from the Social and Political Sciences (SPS) Program of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS) in 2003, Zeynep Bahar Çelik is one of the first graduates of the university. After receiving her bachelor's degree, she immediately started working in Civic Involvement Projects (CIP) at Sabancı University. She completed her master's studies in Communication Strategies at Galatasaray University in 2007. Zeynep Bahar Çelik has been working as the CIP Manager of the university since 2009. She also teaches CIP 101, one of the compulsory courses. 

Zeynep Bahar Çelik’s answers to our four questions are below.

What was your initial memory / impression of when you met Sabancı University for the first time?

Z.B.Ç: I first visited Sabancı University in September 1999. Like every high school senior, I dreamed all year about what kind of university I would go to and what I would experience. Sabancı University was opening for the first time that year, so there was no information I had heard about it or a picture I had seen, everything was left to my imagination. I remember my first day at school like it was yesterday. It was a slightly windy but warm autumn day. As soon as I entered the campus, I was shocked, what I saw was a finished building or two, a lot of construction, and a road that had not even been completed :) I was a little upset, but when we parked in the parking lot of the current School of Languages and started walking to the Rector's building, two people ran from the building and came towards us with their arms open (yes, their arms were really open as if they were to hug us). “Welcome, you have no idea how we were looking forward to seeing you,” they said with a warm smile on their faces. At that moment, the negative feeling that had just emerged in me completely disappeared. Maybe it was not as I had imagined it, but I felt that I had begun a very colorful and different adventure which I was expected to be a part of. 

What are the differences between yourself 20 years ago and yourself today, and how did Sabancı University contribute to that change?

Z.B.Ç: I was actually a child who grew up with self-confidence thanks to the education I received before university and what my family taught to me, but with the educational approach adopted by Sabancı University, my self-confidence was enhanced and evolved into a different dimension. As a student who studied SPS here, I and my friends had a hard time with many of the common and mandatory university courses we took in the first two years. However, even if we had difficulties, we managed to succeed. Yes, I was into social sciences, but I saw that I could replicate DNA or calculate the entropy change if I wanted to. In addition, over the past 20 years, I have experienced countless examples of how I can use things that do not seem to be related with my field by internalizing what I do, how I can see things from a different perspective, and how it enriches my point of view. That is why I would say that one of the biggest differences between Zeynep 20 years ago and Zeynep now is the understanding that anyone can learn anything and self-confidence that it brings. What makes this possible is the unique education that Sabancı University offers to every student who has chosen this place. 

What comes into your mind when you think of Sabancı University in 20 years? What are your dreams for Sabancı University for the next 20 years? What about yourself?

Z.B.Ç: I believe that Sabancı University is an institution that has always been able to look beyond the obvious and into the future from the moment it was conceived as an idea. The many innovations and leading roles it brings to the education system are an indication of this. I sincerely believe that this will not change in 20 years. As a university that instilled in its students to be the creator of change and enjoy it without fear, 20 years later, it will be a university that has its eye on change, researches, produces, and creates. 

20 years later, the number of people whose path has crossed with Sabancı University will also have increased significantly compared to today. I believe that one of the most important elements that make up and add value to a university is its graduates. I believe that the difference, contributions, and impacts of its graduates thanks to the education they receive, which will increase and spread around the world, will be felt very much at the university. 

Where and how would you be now if your paths hadn't crossed with Sabancı University?

Z.B.Ç: One of the things that make Sabancı University stand out is that Civic Involvement Projects (CIP) is among the courses that all students are required to take. Sabancı University is an institution that wants everyone who graduates from here to be not only scientifically qualified in their field of study, but also responsible towards society and acquainted with the concept of active citizenship. Of course, I took this course in my first year as well. 

1999 was also the year of the Izmit earthquake, and it was unthinkable as young people of that time not to reach out to those in need there when the school had just opened. This had a big impact on both the formation and the beginning of the CIP course. After taking the course, I continued to be part of CIP until I graduated, first as a supervisor and then as a consultant. I would say that most of my university life was spent in social responsibility projects and CIP. Most of the friendships that I built there turned out to be life-long friendships. And, of course, most importantly, my experience in CIP defined my career path after graduation. If I had not studied at Sabancı University, I would have continued my life maybe in a different field, maybe in a similar field, but with a very different route. I can say that I took the first steps of the path that led to my job 20 years ago at Sabancı University, where I can remind young university students of their social responsibilities, show them that each of them can make a small difference by going on the field, work with great pleasure. 

To celebrate the 20th year of our university, we have prepared a set of four questions to ask faculty and administrative personnel who have been with us since the beginning, and to our first students. They all tell "the story of 20 years" from their own perspectives.

Going in alphabetical order, this week's interviewee for "The Story of 20 Years" is Zerrin Koyunsağan.

On 5 January 1998, Zerrin Koyunsağan joined Sabancı University as the founding Director of Student Resources with the staff number 37. Zerrin Koyunsağan, who held this position until July 2005, was awarded the title of “Honorary Member of Sabancı University”, awarded to academic and administrative staff who made an exceptional contribution to the university's mission, when she retired from Sabancı University.

Zerrin Koyunsağan joined the Sabancı Foundation in August 2006, made significant contributions to the restructuring process of the foundation, served as the General Director of the Sabancı Foundation between 2011-2018 and as the Vice Chairman of the Sabancı Foundation Board of Trustees between 2018-2020.

Zerrin Koyunsağan’s answers to our four questions are below.

What was your initial memory / impression of when you met Sabancı University for the first time?

Z.K: My first assignment was at METU, where I created institutional systems in the student affairs unit, tested their success, and started thinking about what I would do next. One of these days, I received an invitation for an interview at Sabancı University. Then, I came to Sabancı Center in Istanbul to meet with Hüsnü Paçacıoğlu, the Founding Secretary General of the university, and Tosun Terzioğlu, the Founding Rector, whom I have always remembered with mercy and gratitude. This was my first meeting with Sabancı University. Their dreams related to the university were exactly in line with my dreams, and I accepted the offer with pleasure. 

In January 1998, I started working on the 17th floor of Sabancı Center and worked there until September 1999, when we moved to the campus. As we built everything from scratch, we consulted with each other a lot and experienced new working methods together. We worked hard and formed new friendships at a very exciting and very intense pace. At the same time, we witnessed the times when the culture of the university was created. 

One of my first memories was as follows: All of us who loved Sabancı University very dearly; Mr. Terzioğlu, Mr. Paçacıoğlu, faculty members, administrative staff, were very excited and had a lot of fun enveloping letters to be sent to top 10 thousand students in the university entrance exam up until midnight together. During the selection period, we introduced the university again in the Communication Building in Karaköy. There was no physical university yet, but we were explaining everything to students and their families on a model. Fortunately, we were mostly convincing. The trust that came with the Sabancı name made our job easier. 

Finally, in October 1999, we got our first students, our university opened on a very rainy day, and I was among those who cried with joy. In the first year, construction was still underway on the campus, there were undoubtedly shortcomings, but we could not allow this to make the lives of students harder. We created solutions for each new situation. For example, when we were about to announce the schedule, there was news from the University Services Department; it was not possible for all students to eat at the same time in the temporary cafeteria! We immediately rolled up our sleeves, prepared the schedule again from scratch, kept the others in classroom while a large group of students ate in the cafeteria, and then sent the group that finished their meal to the classroom, took the hungry ones from the classroom, so that we could feed our students without any issues. 

What are the differences between yourself 20 years ago and yourself today, and how did Sabancı University contribute to that change?

Z.K: During the founding years, all faculty members, employees, students, everyone focused on achieving the best and laying the foundations of the University firmly. It was so valuable that I feel lucky to be part of this extraordinary experience. Creating an institutional structure, designing processes introduced different ways of thinking and different perspectives to me. 

I have met beautiful people. The friendship and wisdom of Alev Topuzoğlu, Şükrü Döküçü, the late Hilmi Çelik, Hüsnü Paçacıoğlu, and Tosun Terzioğlu are invaluable to me. I cannot go without mentioning the positive impact of Güler Sabancı's guidance and friendly behavior on both me and the entire team. 

The most important thing was to be together with young people, to learn from them, to be able to contribute to them. 

There were 249 students enrolled in the first year, 75% of whom were on scholarships. Very successful students preferred Sabancı University. It was prestigious to study with a scholarship at Sabancı University because scholarships were awarded based on success. For this reason, many students entered without a scholarship, but later tried to raise their GPA and get a scholarship. We were happy to build the scholarship system based on success. 

What comes into your mind when you think of Sabancı University in 20 years? What are your dreams for Sabancı University for the next 20 years? What about yourself?

Z.K: Sabancı University pioneered the higher education system in Turkey, making a very important difference and setting an example for other universities. Graduates going abroad continue to represent the strong reputation of the university all over the world, successful academics offer the best education and research. Graduates have started working at Sabancı University and continue to own their universities. These are just a few examples of dreams coming to life in the first place. 

After that, I would like to see the solid foundations of Sabancı University become stronger, continue to lead the academy, and take the top place among the leading universities in the world. 

My dream for myself is to live a healthy and enjoyable life with my family and loved ones. 

Where and how would you be now if your paths hadn't crossed with Sabancı University?

Z.K: I think I could have been involved in different projects related to restructuring at METU, or I would have been involved in institutional structuring at a newly established university.