Minister of National Education Mahmut Özer had a meeting with the students who are serving their apprentices and receiving skill training in a company manufacturing machines in Esenyurt district in İstanbul. Özer had his lunch with students at the company cafeteria.

 

Özer listened to students' suggestions about how to increase quality in vocational education and briefed them about the transformation in vocational education.

 

"After the Ministry of National Education lifted coefficient practice in 2012, we carried out important projects in order to reinforce vocational education. Since then, we have been implementing many important projects for both vocational high schools and vocational education centers in order to carry vocational education to a better level," said Özer.

 

Özer noted that amendment made in the Vocational Education Law No. 3308 on December 25, 2021 encouraged students to enroll in vocational education and number of apprentices and foremen increased rapidly since then adding that:

 

"Before the amendment, the number of apprentices and foremen who were working actively in Türkiye was 159 thousand. Recently, a total of 710 thousand apprentices and foremen are enrolled in vocational education centers in the entire country. This important increase provided us the opportunity to educate apprentices and foremen that all sectors, especially small and medium size sectors need."

 

Minister Özer reminded us that students go to school once a week and work at real workplaces four days a week.

 

"Students have the opportunity to learn new skills when they are actively involved in the production process. Apprentices are getting 30 percent of minimum wage as monthly salary while foremen are getting half of minimum wage as monthly salary. They are also insured against occupational illnesses and accidents. This is an advantage for both employers and students. As our President announced earlier, we are planning to enroll 1 million students in these centers until the end of 2022. This is a very important instrument for decreasing young unemployment rates," said Özer.

 

Meanwhile, vocational education center Esila Sazak said, "I have been studying in this center for the last 6 months. I am the first student who passed the foremen exam and I work as a foreman in the center. I receive 2,750 lira monthly salary which is equivalent to half of the minimum wage."

 

Following his visit to the vocational education center, Özer visited the construction site of a high school building in the Orhangazi neighborhood.

 

Özer said that his Ministry reactivated all education investments which were postponed before and they are planning to allocate 12 billion education investments to İstanbul within this year.

 

Özer stressed that the Ministry rapidly solved problems concerning education in 39 districts of İstanbul and went on to say that: "With Allah's permission, we will inaugurate the majority of these schools until 2023 and our children will continue their education in a better environment. On the other hand, we used positive discrimination for İstanbul in the teacher appointments during the recent years. 50 percent of newly appointed teachers are assigned to İstanbul. In other words, we assigned 7,500 of 15,000 teachers who were appointed at the end of January to İstanbul and 10,000 of 20,000 newly appointed teachers to the city. We have assigned 20,000 teachers to schools in İstanbul during this year. We will continue to support İstanbul in 2023."

 

Noting that a new education campus has been under construction on 68 decare land with the support of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and 10,000 students will be enrolled in the center after the end of the construction.

 

There will a science high school, an İmam-Hatip high school, a vocational and technical Anatolia high school and five Anatolia high schools, 150 student dormitory, conference halls, a science and arts center, planetarium, administrative building, an amphitheater and indoor sports center in the education center.