Albany - State University
of New York Chancellor Robert L. King
today announced that the government of Turkey
has provided a $500,000 endowment to support the creation of a Turkish Studies
Program at the Neil D. Levin Graduate Institute of International Relations and
Commerce in New York, NY.
The endowment announcement culminates a 10-day visit by
the former president of Turkey, Suleyman Demirel, and Turkish Higher
Education President Kemal Guruz to New York
to strengthen academic and research ties between Cornell University,
the SUNY College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Cornell, Binghamton University
and other SUNY campuses.
“This is a great opportunity for students and faculty in
America and Turkey, the Turkish
Council of Higher Education and for the State University of New York,” said
King. “Working with former President Demirel, President Gürüz and their
staffs has been a great pleasure and I would like to extend the appreciation of
the State University of New York to the Republic
of Turkey and the Turkish Council of Higher
Education for their generosity and hard work on this very successful
collaboration.”
King made the announcement at a lunch hosted by the
Foreign Policy Institute in New York
In September, SUNY and the Turkish Higher Education
Council successfully launched a new dual diploma program that has placed 350
Turkish students in
ten dual diploma programs in six subject areas; business, economics, global and
international affairs, information systems and technology, marine engineering
and marine transportation and management engineering. Binghamton University, SUNY College at New Paltz and SUNY Maritime College are currently involved
in the dual diploma program. More than 3,700 Turkish students applied to be
accepted to this program.
As part of the visit, Cornell University and the SUNY
College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Cornell held a seminar with Turkish
development experts and engineering students to provide an overview of
Cornell’s and SUNY’s involvement in providing faculty expertise to Turkey’s
Southeastern Anatolia Project (GAP), one of the largest hydrological and
economic development projects in the world that covers an area of 75,000 square
kilometers and a population of six million people in the southeastern part of
Turkey.
As another element of the visit President Guruz was
presented with an honorary degree of humane letters and former President Demirel
was presented with a special citation at a convocation held at Binghamton University.
The
recently launched dual diploma joint program is administered by a Turkish
university and its partner State University campus. After
successfully completing all required coursework, the degree recipient will
receive two diplomas – one from each institution. No student will receive
the degree or either of the diplomas without satisfying the academic
requirements of the dual diploma joint program. In order to earn a dual diploma, students must spend one year at the
partner campus. Students will also take advantage of distance learning
technology to earn their degree.
Once established, The Turkish Studies Program at the
Levin Institute will support lectures, conferences, symposia, academic
research, faculty exchanges and other academic initiatives.
The
State University of New York is the largest comprehensive university system in
the United
States
educating more than 410,000 students in 6,650 programs on 64 campuses.
