Education Programs

A group of Ph.D. students and faculty members from Columbia University embarked on a 2,000-kilometer odyssey through the ancient wonders of Western Türkiye. Organized in collaboration with Columbia’s Center for Ancient Mediterranean, this nine-day expedition on the Turkish coasts explored 17 significant ancient sites and 13 archeology museums.

More than just a sightseeing tour, the trip was designed to inspire each Ph.D. student to deepen their research. From Halicarnassus and Pergamon to Assos, Troia, Ephesus, and Constantinopolis, the itinerary showcased the legacy of the ancient Mediterranean world and beyond, spanning the Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, and at some sites even the Seljuk and Ottoman eras.

This scholarly journey provided a firsthand opportunity, with a dedicated Ph.D. student from Columbia assuming the role of an instructor each day to deliver their presentations about specific research in the visited sites.

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With a youth-led, bottom-up approach, the main goal of this project is to create a network of university students, advocating for a curriculum update in their universities to have a multidisciplinary and required course on global citizenship including topics such as sustainable development, climate change, international migration, one health, health equity, social inclusion, prevention of stigma, racism, and discrimination, in addition to global diplomacy and cooperation.

A collaboration of Columbia University’s Center for Sustainable Development, School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia Global Centers in Istanbul and Tunis, Boğaziçi University, Anadolu University, South Mediterranean University, and Global Master’s in Development Practice Program, the project launched in Istanbul in 2022 and expanded its reach in Tunis in 2023.

By providing students with the necessary knowledge and skills, the project seeks to enable students from selected universities in Türkiye and Tunis to assume active roles in building more peaceful, tolerant, inclusive, and secure societies.

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Entitled “Beyond the ‘Refugee Crisis’: Refugees in Türkiye and Global Public Policy”, this 10-day course was intended to expand students’ hands-on knowledge of Syrian refugees through a visit to the country that hosts the largest such population in the world.

Designed and led by Professor Daniel Naujoks, interim director of the International Organization and UN Studies specialization, the course offered a unique learning experience to 20 students within SIPA’s Master of International Affairs program.

Participants convened at Columbia Global Center Istanbul for classes on refugee law and policy in Türkiye and the world, multilateral cooperation, and how displacement-centered efforts link to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. They also took a two-day trip to the southeastern city of Gaziantep, which hosts a large number of refugees from Syria. In both locations, students met with experts in various fields, political officials, and representatives of multilateral organizations—from both Türkiye and other countries.

The Syrian-American journalist Rasha Elass, for example, who covered Syria and the Middle East for more than 10 years, detailed her experience working in Syria and reporting on the several waves of refugees fleeing the country. Professor Ahmet İçduygu, director of the Migration Research Center at Koç University, explained Turkish policies regarding the influx of Syrian refugees, while UN resident coordinator Irena Vojackova Sollorano and Selen Ay of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees provided a deep dive into UN operations in Türkiye.

For more information, click here.

As part of the Kraft Global Fellows Program, an initiative of the Kraft Family Fund for Intercultural and Interfaith Awareness and the Office of the University Chaplain, six Columbia University students traveled to Türkiye with the University Chaplain Jewelnel Davis.

The purpose of the trip was to provide Columbia University students with an opportunity to add a global perspective to their academic experience by utilizing the resources of the Global Center in Istanbul. Participants gained a deeper understanding of the diverse cultural and religious backgrounds in Türkiye and the region, exploring topics such as multi-faith interconnectivity and diversity. During this visit, the Chaplain and students had the chance to meet with various religious leaders and representatives from different denominations, as well as with representatives from community and faith-based organizations.

In 2015, Columbia University launched a semester long global core course in Istanbul, building upon existing relationships with Boğaziçi University and the Columbia Global Center Istanbul.

Offered in the spring semester, the program is anchored by two seminars, taught by two distinguished Columbia faculty, Martha Howell, Miriam Champion Professor of History, from the Department of History and Karen Van Dyck, Kimon A. Doukas Professor of Modern Greek Literature from the Department of Classics.

The course combined perspectives from several disciplines, with special emphasis on history, literature, and cultural studies, to examine how Greek society and culture has been interpreted and appropriated from the Middle Ages to the present. In 2015, Professor Howell explored western Europeans’ encounters with Byzantium and their experience of the early Ottoman Empire after the 1453 conquest of Constantinople using historical sources of various kinds: contemporary narratives, financial records, art and architecture, along with studies by modern scholars reflecting on the meaning of these sources. Professor Van Dyck, on the other hand, moved to the modern world, examining how conditions of modernity, postcoloniality, and globality fashion themselves in engagement with certain persistent imaginaries of Greece.

During the program, students enrolled in a Turkish language course and chose at least one elective course from a variety of disciplines at Boğaziçi University to help navigate their encounters in modern day Istanbul.

The Istanbul Center organized an orientation, field trips and a number of public events throughout the semester. These included a talk on “Pilgrimage: The Case of the Hajiis” featuring Associate Professor Valentina Izmirlieva from Columbia University, Department of Slavic Studies, a panel discussion on “Cultural Intimacy and the Crisis (of Patronage)” by Professor Michael Taussig, Columbia University, Department of Anthropology, a poetry reading on “Cyprus, Divided Cities, and the Geopolitics of Translation” featuring Professor Lawrance Venuti, Temple University, Department of English and Cypriot poet Mehmet Yashin; and a screening of Elia Kazan’s “America America” at the Zografyan Greek School. In 2015, the program was taken by four Columbia undergraduate students and three students from Boğaziçi University.

In Spring 2016, the program was simultaneously co-taught by Professor Dimitrios Antoniou in New York and Professor Matthew Gumpert in Istanbul.

Between 2013 and 2015, Columbia University, in partnership with Boğaziçi University, offered a joint summer program aimed at advanced undergraduate and graduate students. Facilitated by the Global Center in Istanbul, the program focused on the history, urban development, and historic monuments of Istanbul, historically known as Byzantion and Constantinople.

Led by Professor Holger Klein from the Department of Art History and Archaeology, the program combined academic courses with site visits, providing students with a solid understanding of Istanbul’s modern landscape. The program also included a research and fieldwork component, where students gained practical experience in architectural site surveys, photography, archival work, and architectural preservation.

In 2015, the program featured three courses:

• "Architecture of the Sultans: Form, Function, and Ideology in the Imperial Mosques of Istanbul," taught by Dr. Ünver Rüstem, Fari Sayeed Visiting Fellow in Islamic Art, Pembroke College, Cambridge.
• "Byzantion – Constantinople – Istanbul: A City and its Monuments," offered by Dr. Nikolas Bakirtzis from the Cyprus Institute.
• "Istanbul Heritage and Public Space," led by Dr. Rachel Iannacone, an independent scholar.

The program included three undergraduate students from Columbia University and five from Boğaziçi University, fostering a collaborative learning experience. Through this program, students enhanced their academic knowledge and gained practical skills relevant to art history, archaeology, and architectural preservation.

Columbia University launched an intensive three-week summer program focused on democracy in June 2015. The program took place in Tunis and Istanbul and enrolled 14 Columbia students alongside 12 students from leading universities in Egypt, Lebanon, Tunisia and Türkiye. Taught by Professor John Huber, Professor of Political Science at Columbia University, the program focused on the concept of democracy, the challenges of democratic transitions and consolidation, and trade-offs associated with different ways of designing constitutions and organizing democratic institutions.

The Istanbul Center organized a series of lectures with renowned guest speakers including Professor Mustafa Aydın, Rector of Kadir Has University, Professor Fuat Keyman, Director of Istanbul Policy Center, Professor Binnaz Toprak, member of Grand National Assembly of Türkiye, Ömer Madra, co-founder and editor-in-chief of the radio channel Açık Radyo, Professor Ersin Kalaycıoğlu, Sabancı University, and Yaman Akdeniz, an associate professor of Law at the Human Rights Law Research Center, Faculty of Law, Istanbul Bilgi University. The lectures allowed students to gain further insight on a number of current issues including the 2015 Turkish parliamentary elections, freedom of speech, the Kurdish issue and gender equality in Türkiye.

The program is supported by the President’s Global Innovation Fund and the Lee C. and Jean Magnano Bollinger Fellowship.

In January 2015, Kraft Global Fellows explored inter-faith dialogue in a program led by the University Chaplain Jewelnel Davis.

Columbia Global Center Istanbul, in collaboration with the Office of the University Chaplain, designed a one-week program for Kraft Fellows’ trip to Türkiye. After the initial days spent in Ephesus, the fellows travelled to Istanbul to attend a series of meetings and visits to several religious and cultural sites.

Kraft Fellows visited the Office of Istanbul Mufti, the Istanbul Ecumenical Patriarchate, the Istanbul Armenian Patriarchate and the Chief Rabbinate in Istanbul. The fellows also participated in a Christmas Service at Armenian Surp Asvadzadzin Church in the Kumkapı district of Istanbul. Additional visits were organized to landmark sites such as Topkapı Palace, Hagia Sophia, and Chora Church Museum among many others.

The program proved to be a unique opportunity for the Kraft fellows to explore religious pluralism and understand how diverse religious communities interact with each other in Türkiye.

Nearly 40 Columbia Business School students joined the Chazen Institute’s Global Immersion Program to explore how Türkiye’s startup scene has grown and evolved over the years. Global Immersion Program classes bridge classroom lessons and business practices of a country besides the US. These three-credit classes spend the first half of the semester in New York prior to a one-week visit to the country of focus. During the immersion week, students have the opportunity to meet with business executives and government officials while working on team projects.

In preparation for the study visit, students spent six weeks in classes with Professor Jack McGourty, Director of Community and Global Entrepreneurship at the Columbia Business School, learning about the selected country’s business environment, political context and other factors that influence its startup culture. Over the course of their week in Türkiye, students met with business leaders, visited startup incubators, and connected with entrepreneurs who are operating at the forefront of innovation. The Istanbul Center hosted the students for a seminar with the distinguished political scientist Soli Özel of Kadir Has University, who gave a lecture about geopolitical developments in the region. The Center also organized a panel discussion featuring specialists and entrepreneurs from Endeavour.