U.S. State Department, Citing Security, Suspends [Fulbright] Teaching Program in Turkey


Date posted: September 1, 2016

ANEMONA HARTOCOLLIS

Joanna Birkner was looking forward to teaching English in Turkey on a Fulbright award this year. But last week, she received an email from a program official saying that teaching assistant placements in Turkey had been suspended for the school year.

The letter came on July 25, 10 days after the attempted coup in Turkey, amid continuing turmoil in that country. It said the restoration of the program for the 2017-18 school year would be contingent on the “security situation” in Turkey.

“It came as a big disappointment,” Ms. Birkner said. “When you have a plan, it’s a little bit like having the rug pulled out from under you.”

In the wake of the coup attempt, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey has conducted widespread purges of perceived adversaries. As a result, every university dean in Turkey was forced to resign. Some experts have raised questions about whether the university system will be able to function. The ripple effects to American academics are just starting to emerge.

About 80 people like Ms. Birkner have had their awards in Turkey under the Fulbright English Teaching Assistant Program canceled. The awards are sponsored by the State Department.

A National Security Education Program, the Boren awards, has also been disrupted, participants said.

Several participants in another State Department effort, the Critical Language Scholarship Program, said they were told in late April, even before the coup attempt, that their studies would be moved from Turkey to Azerbaijan.

A State Department spokeswoman said it had also suspended high school exchange programs in Turkey for American students. The more prestigious Fulbright research grants were not affected.

Many award recipients have been studying Turkish language and culture for years, and want to go into the foreign service. They said the cancellation was a setback not only for their careers, but also for the cause of international relations at a difficult time in the Middle East.

“What’s going on in Turkey right now is really extraordinary and definitely something that should be watched closely,” said Ms. Birkner, 22, a recent graduate of Bryn Mawr College whose interest in Turkey was piqued by a National Geographic cover of Turkish ruins when she was 17. “Ultimately, I think it’s even more of a reason that there need to be young Americans who can speak the language, who can understand the conflict from the ground up.”

Olivia Loveland, another award winner, who just graduated from Portland State University in Oregon, said she thought her posting in the Turkish city of Erzurum would have been no more dangerous than going to France or Belgium, where there have been recent terrorist attacks, or even San Bernardino, Calif., where a friend of hers was wounded in the mass shooting that killed 14 in December.

“I just kind of expect that those things happen everywhere,” she said.

Ms. Birkner is hoping to go to Turkey on her own. She has been checking Turkish help-wanted ads and said she was finding a high demand for English-speaking employees because there was an exodus of expatriates in the immediate aftermath of the coup attempt.

Correction: August 11, 2016
An article on Saturday about a decision by the State Department to suspend a teaching program in Turkey misidentified the program that was canceled. It is the Fulbright English Teaching Assistant Program, not the Fulbright Foreign Language Teaching Assistant Program.

Source: New York Times , AUG. 5, 2016


Related News

US intel director: Turkish purge impeding fight against ‘Islamic State’

Turkey’s purge has removed military officers who’d been key figures in the US-led fight against the so-called “Islamic State,” says US intelligence head James Clapper. He called it a setback in US-Turkish cooperation.

Gov’t’s pressure for closure of Turkish schools abroad yields no result

The movement that started out a quarter-century ago to support education for children abroad starting with the autonomous Azerbaijani republic of Nakhchivan has now reached 160 foreign countries, with the founders of the movement and its volunteers welcomed with open arms around the world.

Thunder’s Enes Kanter in London after detainment in Romania over politics

Oklahoma City Thunder center Enes Kanter, who said he was detained in Romania on Saturday morning after his passport was seized by the Turkish government, has been allowed to leave the country and is in London, the NBA said.

State discrimination against Hizmet movement sympathizers

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government is aiming to take all steps to finish off Hizmet movement sympathizers by any means. Discrimination is one of these steps. Discrimination is a human rights violation. I would like to share five of my personal experiences, of many more, to show what kind of discrimination is being committed against the movement’s sympathizers.

Gov’t attack on Bank Asya taints Turkey’s image

Attempts by the Turkish government to sink Bank Asya have tainted Turkey’s image, according to French-based Institute for Research on the International Economy expert Deniz Ünal, speaking to the Cihan news agency.

GYV slams government attempt to silence critics with recent measures

The Journalists and Writers Foundation (GYV) expresses that the interim Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government is continuing to use terror cases in an attempt to silence critical press.

Latest News

Fethullah Gulen – man of education, peace and dialogue – passes away

Fethullah Gülen’s Condolence Message for South African Human Rights Defender Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Hizmet Movement Declares Core Values with Unified Voice

Ankara systematically tortures supporters of Gülen movement, Kurds, Turkey Tribunal rapporteurs say

Erdogan possessed by Pharaoh, Herod, Hitler spirits?

Devious Use of International Organizations to Persecute Dissidents Abroad: The Erdogan Case

A “Controlled Coup”: Erdogan’s Contribution to the Autocrats’ Playbook

Why is Turkey’s Erdogan persecuting the Gulen movement?

Purge-victim man sent back to prison over Gulen links despite stage 4 cancer diagnosis

In Case You Missed It

Turkey Assails a Revered Islamic Moderate

Turkish community leader in Hampshire condemns Russian ambassador’s assassination

People overwhelmingly support democracy as answer to Kurdish issue

Foreword to “The Gulen Movement: Civic Service without Borders”

President Obama sends message to Gulen-inspired International Cultural Festival

Turks Fleeing To Greece Find Mostly Warm Welcome, Despite History

Arabs, Turks attempt to redefine Arab uprisings, political trajectories

Copyright 2025 Hizmet News