Koç University
International relations
Dytmar van Poeteren d.van.poeteren@student.rug.nl
I spend my Erasmus exchange at Koç university, Istanbul. It is a private, relatively small university of some 6000 students in a quiet outskirt of Istanbul. The main language in the university is English. I think the university offers quite an extensive array of courses for exchange students, mainly due to the fact that all courses are taught in English and therefore accessible for exchange students. During my stay I followed the following courses: Statistics, Quantitative Reasoning Using Computers, Social Origins of Wealth, Social Network Analysis and Turkish. Each course taught at Koç University over a span of half a year and is worth 6 ECTS.
The university is very well organized and provides excellent assistance to prepare you for your exchange. Arzu Dalyan (email address: adalyan@ku.edu.tr) can be addressed for questions regarding your exchange. My experience with the exchange assistants has been very positive, as they are very quick with responding and moreover helpful. Sometimes the bureaucracy of the university did leave a little confused on when to contact whom.
I found the quality of the courses taken somewhat too simple and therefore unmotivating.
Maybe it was due to the fact that I was taking courses designed for first and second years, but the quality of the teaching was lower than I’m used to at University of Groningen. Moreover, I have to say that the level of English spoken by the students is quite low, making class
discussions somewhat slow and boring to witness. It was not uncommon that students posed their questions in Turkish. The teachers their level of English was fine.
The university organizes an introduction program in the first week, wherein the students are taught how everything on the campus works. They also organize social activities like a city tour and a pub crawl, to get to know the city. The exchange students are assigned a mentor, that is, a local student who throughout the exchange is available for helping you out when you have questions. These mentors take their position quite seriously and are very helpful.
The university offers accommodation in form of dormitories. These are located some 2 km from the main campus, and transport from the dormitories to the campus is free and widely
available. Your share your room with two local students. Last year, most exchange students did not have to pay for the accommodation, but I can’t vouch it will be the same the next year.
Personally, I decided to find my own accommodation. I did this because the accommodation was not free for me (due to applying later than normal) and because I wanted to live close to the center of Istanbul. This is the main drawback of living on campus. It is very convenient, but you are isolated, travelling to the center takes you one hour and transport is scarce at night. If you opt for finding accommodation yourself, Facebook is the best way to go. There are plenty of rooms available and you typically pay between 200 and 300 euro.
Istanbul is a relatively cheap city when it comes down to public transport, clothes and food.
Alcohol is roughly the same price as in the Netherlands. You’ll have less expenses than in Groningen, especially if you opt for the free accommodation provided by the university.
Turkish language is quite hard to grasp but I found that you can work your way around by using English. The people are very much orientated to tourism and therefore most of them grasp basic English. Not knowing Turkish means getting treated as a tourist, which can be slightly annoying at times. The university offers courses in Turkish, which I would recommend. Grasping the basics really earns you respect from the locals and gets you out of the tourist bubble.
Overall, I really enjoyed my exchange in Istanbul and am very happy with my choice. The university is very well organized, but the academic level is certainly lower than at the university of Groningen. For me, Istanbul, and Turkey in general compensated for this. It is an amazing country with lots to discover. The city is very unique and lively, you will not run out of things to do and see.
I think a lot of people are held back from choosing Turkey because they fear it being unsafe. I don’t think this should stop you if you want to go. I did not experience dangerous situations during my stay, and personally found the political situation sad, but very intriguing to witness.
