An Analysis on Research and Application Centers in Turkey
Journal Title: Yükseköğretim ve Bilim Dergisi - Year 2017, Vol 7, Issue 3
Abstract
In developing countries like Turkey, universities are expected to contribute to the formation and implementation of knowledge and social development. This is the case not only for developing countries, but also for developed countries. The modern university concept is based on these foundations. Similar to modern universities in other countries, our universities also bring the dimensions of education, knowledge and economy together. Therefore, the purpose of universities and establishing research and application centers at universities are to identify the social needs and problems and to find solutions accordingly. Research and application centers are those universitybased institutions in which mostly interdisciplinary studies are conducted and they are supported by governmental agencies, private companies or other institutions. Although the effectiveness of these centers, which work in connection with the rectorship or other units is arguable, many research and application centers have been established in our country especially at state universities. The purpose of this study is to examine the information presented in Web sites and the regulations of research and application centers established before 2000. In this document analysis, firstly, the numerical data were examined by using percentage and frequency values. As a result, the distribution of these centers in private and state universities was found out. In the second phase, research and application centers were classified under 13 categories according to their research areas and five categories were selected among those which had the highest number of centers. The regulations, goals and activities of 3 centers from each category were subjected to content analysis. According to the findings, there are 73 state and private universities which were established before 2000. There is a total of 1677 research and application centers at these 73 universities according to the information retrieved from their web sites. 1211 of these centers have online access. However, the information shared by the centers in online platforms varies significantly. In our country, research and application centers are concentrated in regions where more early established universities are located. In addition, Istanbul and Ankara, which have more universities than other cities, affect the number of centers in the regions. It is also seen that 466 centers are not accessed online at all. An analysis of regulations show that those centers which work in the same domain and share the same name display many differences both in terms of their goals and areas of activity. These differences are remarkable especially in activity areas. According to data obtained from the regulations, activity areas fall into the categories of research, application, technology/material/program development, finance and consultancy. The research and application centers at different universities vary in the way they pay attention to and put emphasis on these categories. . It is also observed that research and application centers do not work very actively and those centers which are more active give more importance to practice rather than research. Centers such as ongoing education and distance education, whose focus is not research, and research hospitals seems to work actively.
Authors and Affiliations
Feride ÖKSÜZ GÜL, Yusuf ALPAYDIN
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