Ozyegin University Turkey
The Hüsnü M. Özyeğin Foundation began its efforts to establish Özyeğin University in the fall of 2005. The foundation for Özyeğin University entailed comprehensive surveys conducted with more than 500 subjects including businessmen, faculty members, and university and high school students, in addition to a study on “Developing Sectors and Professions in Turkey and in the World”. Based on the results of these studies, ARAMA Consulting began the designing process. The University’s fundamental values and vision were discussed and identified in collaboration with all of the stakeholders. Özyeğin University shaped its vision through a series of workshops. More than 300 participants attended these workshops, including businessmen, faculty members, university students, and new graduates.
In line with its collectively-shaped vision, Özyeğin University was officially established on May 18, 2007 to serve as a unique university that would contribute to social development through its modern education system, innovative structure integrated with life, academic approach intertwined with sectors, and academic programs tailored accordingly.
Özyeğin University welcomed its first students on its Altunizade Campus in September 2008, and opened the doors of its Çekmeköy Campus in September 2011.
Çekmeköy Campus
The Özyeğin University Çekmeköy Campus is a quiet, peaceful, and tranquil university campus. Created by a leading architecture firm, which also designed the buildings of the University of Cambridge and Princeton University, the OzU Çekmeköy Campus is Turkey’s first LEED-certified campus. Situated on 280,000 square meters of land, the campus offers all the amenities and facilities necessary to foster students’ academic development, and their exposure to social, sportive, and cultural events, through its quiet and comfortable study rooms, modern classrooms, and laboratories, 15,000 square meter Athletic Center, 2,600 square meter library, and its two auditoriums with a 350- and 372-person capacity, respectively.
Ozyegin University aims to prepare high-impact graduates who make a difference
Since its founding, Özyeğin University has embraced the mission of third-generation universities led by top-notch universities such as MIT and Cambridge. With this mission, Özyeğin University opened its doors as an “entrepreneurial research university”. Today, Özyeğin University is forging ahead with unwavering commitment to “developing value-added projects at the service of society.” To achieve this goal, the OzU faculty has been relentlessly developing new projects that have a potential for commercialization, in addition to rigorously conducting research studies and publishing articles in international journals.
Özyeğin University was established with the mission of serving society as an entrepreneurial and research-focused learning center, which is integrated with modern life. In line with this mission, Özyeğin University offers an innovative education model that adds value to students to prepare them as entrepreneurial and resourceful graduates vested with an in-depth knowledge about the rising professions, a good command of at least one foreign language, highly developed skills in information and communication technologies, and a sheer talent in putting their knowledge into practice. Özyeğin University endeavors to instill in students the passion and dedication to make a difference both for their employers and their community by capitalizing on the skills, competencies, and experiences they acquire both in academia and in the real world. OzU cultivates not only “professionals” but also “entrepreneurs”.
Özyeğin University believes that all students, no matter what their circumstances might be, must have access to high quality education. In the 2017-2019 academic year, 86 percent of all of the undergraduate students at Özyeğin University hold scholarships. Today, the University operates with 6 faculties, 2 vocational schools, and 3 graduate schools, offering a total of 23 undergraduate and 21 graduate programs. Özyeğin University prepares its students for life on its Çekmeköy Campus spanning 280 thousand sqm area of land.
Vision and Mission
We are a financially accessible and entrepreneurial research university. In all of our programs, we aspire to be recognized nationally and internationally as one of the top ten in Turkey, Eastern Europe and the Middle East, and one of the world’s 200 best. Our graduates will be known for making an immediate difference for their employers.
Özyeğin University’s mission is to create, share, and apply knowledge in the service of society. Our applied research agenda creates useful knowledge. We share our knowledge through our educational programs which transform the lives of our students. Application of this knowledge generates economic benefits to the society through start-up and spin-out companies, and through improved efficiency and productivity for existing companies.
Basic Values
The leading values of Özyeğin University are freedom, flexibility, multidimensionality and accessibility.
- The university will be an advocate of academic freedom and institutional autonomy.
- The university will provide extensive flexibility to students, staff members, and the institutions with which it cooperates. With characteristics such as flexible structures, dynamic programs and freedom in the choice of courses, the university shall provide its students and researchers with the possibility to adapt to rapidly changing business life as well as education and research opportunities that can be customized in accordance with individual differences.
- The university will adopt a multidimensional approach which will offer different possibilities and characteristics, and develop an environment including different cultures and points of view. The university will evolve in an environment of diversity providing different opportunities for intercultural exchange, and supporting creativity, learning and discovery. In this context, great importance will be attached to international exchange programs for students and professors and international academic cooperation such as Erasmus+ Global Exchange Swiss European Mobility.
With an effective operation and financial support model, the university will be financially accessible to students from various segments of Turkey and the region. Thanks to an effective scholarship system, the university will provide opportunities for brilliant and successful students whose resources are limited; in addition to this, within the framework of an innovative credit system, it will create opportunities for the students who are willing to undertake financial responsibility for their studies.
Equality and Non-Discrimination Statement
Özyeğin University hires academic and administrative staff, admits students, cooperates with third parties regardless of gender, race, color, national or ethnic origin, creed, religion, age, disability, political identity, marital status, sexual orientation or gender identity. Özyeğin University does not tolerate any type of prohibited discrimination in the administration of its educational and employment policies, its scholarship conferment, or any university-sponsored programs or activities.
Education Philosophy
At Özyeğin University, we believe that each student is a unique individual who needs an inclusive, safe and caring environment that supports student engagement and achievement in academics, co-curricular as well as extra-curricular activities for their intellectual, professional and social development. It is our desire to help students meet their fullest potential through the OzU transformational journey that is student-centered and learning-oriented. We aim OzU graduates to lead and excel in business life, in social service, as entrepreneurs and scholars as responsible world citizens who think consequentially and engage constructively. We believe that the university’s role is to guide and provide institutionally streamlined student experience through innovative learning communities, inclusive student-centered advising services, access to hands-on activities with direct interaction between students and faculty. We encourage students to construct knowledge as they learn to find answers to their questions, discover for themselves and practice skills necessary to reach their goals.
Furthermore, one of our high hopes as a university that puts sustainability at the nexus of its research, teaching and service activities is to instill in our students the intrinsic motivation to address global challenges humanity faces, including those related to poverty, inequality, climate, environmental degradation, prosperity, and peace and justice. We believe there is a need for compassionate, strong, and dedicated individuals who are excited about promoting prosperity while protecting the planet.
In this context, we refer to the students’ lifecycle at OzU as their transformational journey/ Transformative Student Experience.
Learning and Teaching Capabilities Framework: Transformative Student Experience
OzU Transformative Student Experience (TSE) is the name given to the whole process that OzU provides to its students in order to align their knowledge and skills with the world standards and to give them the ability to transform themselves by learning to learn. The process is structured and supervised with a student journey mapping which enables continuous planning, monitoring and improvement of the learning experience.
The core dimensions of OzU TSE that complement and reinforce the bachelor curriculum are:
Sectoral Knowledge & Skills: The bachelor curriculum at OzU provides scientific knowledge, as well as hard and soft skills development that not only train students academically, but also prepare them for their roles as citizens and as professionals in society. To this end, academic curriculum is augmented with an innovative sectoral education program and hands on experiential learning that strengthen the link between research orientation of the university and its commitment to providing student-centered, applied education in a systematic, reasoned and coherent manner across the various faculties and throughout the student journey.
Sectoral Education Program is a crucial and unique part of the OzU curriculum, designed to prepare our students as academically, professionally, and socially resourceful graduates who add value to their professional and civic communities. The program consists of Sectoral Solution courses, where students are exposed to different sectors and career tracks through a curriculum enriched with online resources, guest speakers, sectoral analyses, case studies, simulations and practicum projects. The program’s second component is the co-curricular mandatory internship for all undergraduate degree programs. The program also includes extra-curricular component where all OzU students are encouraged to benefit from voluntary (non-credit) internship opportunities on-campus as well as off-campus in Turkey and abroad. Finally; a centralized Professional Development office with dedicated full-time advisors offers various group as well as individual trainings designed specifically for every stage of the student lifecycle to help students make their respective career aspirations a tangible reality.
Meta Learning: Learning to learn, as students shape their learning paths is the key component of OzU TSE. This involves the students’ recognizing opportunities for improvement, believing that they can successfully improve, and learning to effectively plan, monitor, and evaluate their learning strategies.
There are four specialized administrative aspects of this framework that are essential for its facilitation:
- Digitalization of education: Digital transformation of education tools starting with the textbooks and assessments in common courses allow us to follow the data on the topics and skills that students need support.
b) OzU analytics: Tracking of learning and teaching experience through data analytics entail analysis of learning, analysis of courses and analysis of student success and engagement at the institutional level.
c) OzU advising: Professional advisors assist students during their freshman and sophomore years with developmental and proactive advising.
d) OzU learning and development: The findings from the above processes are evaluated and analyzed in order to implement improvements in the OzU Curriculum and student lifecycle experience.
Exchange Programs
Erasmus Exchange Program
Global Exchange Program
Swiss European Mobility Program (SEMP)
Erasmus+ Traineeship
Faculties and Programs
Faculty of Business
Business Administration
Economics
Entrepreneurship
International Finance
International Business and Trade
Management Information Systems
Faculty of Engineering
Computer Science Department
Electrical & Electronics Engineering Department
Industrial Engineering Department
Mechanical Engineering Department
Civil Engineering Department
Department of Natural and Mathematical Sciences
Faculty of Social Sciences
Department of Psychology
International Relations
Department of Humanities and Social Sciences
Faculty of Aviation and Aeronautical Sciences
Aviation Management Program
Professional Flight Program
Faculty of Law
Faculty of Architecture and Design
Architecture
Industrial Design
Communication Design
Interior Architecture and Environmental Design
Graduate School of Engineering and Science
Architecture
Industrial Engineering
Mechanical Engineering
Civil Engineering
Electrical & Electronics Engineering
Computer Science
Graduate School of Business
MBA
Executive MBA
Financial Engineering and Risk Management
PhD in Business
Graduate School of Social Sciences
Public Law Master’s Degree Program (Thesis)
Private Law Master’s Degree Program (Thesis)
Psychology Master’s Degree Program (Thesis)
Psychology Master’s Degree Program (Non-thesis)
Design, Technology and Society Master’s Degree Program (Thesis)
Public Law PhD Program
Design, Technology and Society PhD Program
School of Applied Sciences
Undergraduate Gastronomy and Culinary Arts Program
Undergraduate Hotel Management Program
School of Languages (ScOLa)
Preparatory English Program
Undergraduate English Program
Modern Languages Program
