Times Higher Education (THE) revealed the list of The World's Best Small Universities 2016 compiled among entrants of the 2015-2016 World University Rankings which teach in at least 4 of the fields of arts and humanities, medicine and health, engineering and technology, natural sciences, life sciences, and social sciences, and have fewer than five thousand students. Accordingly, Sabancı University was among the top 20 universities with fewer than five thousand students enrolled.

Sabancı University President Professor Nihat Berker said the following about the THE rankings: "As mentioned by the THE Editor, scale and focus are of vast importance for the performance of a university in serving its students, the society, and science. We are delighted to have ranked 10th on this list, keeping up the rankings success we enjoyed last year."

Regarding Turkish univesities in the list, Times Higher Education Editor-in-Chief Phil Baty said: "Size matters in universities. Large universities are better for some students; others believe small schools are the best choice. Small universities provide a potentially more intimate setting where students receive more support. Large universities may have star professors, but they are busy most of the time. In small universities, students feel like part of a community. Turkish universities were represented fairly well in the World's Best Small Universities rankings. The list is topped by the California Institute of Technology while Turkish universities possess everything that a small university can offer, regardless of where it is located."

The list includes 20 universities worldwide.  Ranking first was the California Institute of Technology, second and third were École Normale Supérieure and École Polytechnique, fourth was the Pohang University of Science and Technology from South Korea, fifth was École Normale Supérieure de Lyon, sixth was the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, seventh was the Oregon Health and Science University, eighth was Koç University from Turkey, ninth was University of Alaska Fairbanks, and tenth was Sabancı University. The remainder of the list included universities from Switzerland, Japan (3), Taiwan, India (2), United States (2) and Russia.

Career Courses Begin

The Sabancı University Career Office will begin Career Courses in the 2015-16 spring semester in association with the School of Management and Sabancı Holding. The course will be open to 50 students to provide them direction in their future careers, present a systematic approach for personal development, and inform them on the expectations of businesses. 

The course will be available to School of Management students on a priority basis.  At the end of the one-credit course (MNGMT 491, Career and Professional Development Course), students will be able to define the career management process, use techniques such as MBTI for personal development, understand how leaders make decisions, and gain skills in creative thought and solution-orientedness, adaptation and flexibility, and time and stress management. 

Courses will be delivered in four main modules, each featuring human resources directors from the leading companies of their respective industries as guest speakers. The first module, "Personal Development and Introduction to Career", will be given by Sabancı University School of Management faculty member Yusuf Soner. The second module, to be delivered by executives of Sabancı Holding group companies, is titled "Expectations of Businesses".  The third module, titled “Decisions of Leaders” will be given by Egon Zehnder Turkey Managing Partner Murat Yeşildere. The fourth and last module will deal with problem solving, stress and time management, and will be delivered by various business professionals. 

The Career Course will cover 14 weeks. Guest lecturers will be Brisa HR Director Nilgün Özkan in week 4, Çimsa General Manager Nevra Çetin Özhatay in week 9, and Sabancı Holding Industry Group President Mehmet Pekarun in week 12. The final lecture of the course will be delivered by Sabancı Holding Human Resources Division President Neriman Ülsever. 

SAS, a global leader in analytics, will support Turkey's first and only Big Data Behavioral Analysis and Visualization Lab established by Sabancı University in association with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the strategic partnership of Akbank. By sponsoring the Lab's efforts to develop demos and prototypes of new business models for associated groups, sector analysts and managers through the models and findings generated during studies, SAS will leverage its global expertise for all processes, contributing to the success of the project.

Turkey's first and only Big Data Behavioral Analysis and Visualization Lab was established by Sabancı University in association with MIT and with the strategic partnership of Akbank to carry out big data analytics that will address the needs of the industry and businesses. The Lab now receives further support from SAS, a global leader in analytics. SAS will provide analytics software and global expertise to make significant contributions to the success of the project.

The lab will be the setting for close cooperation and joint research with MIT Media Lab Human Dynamics Group faculty and researchers. The Human Dynamics Group strives to explain the behavior of people in daily life and social settings based on the analysis of Big Data collected from various sources, and seeks to develop mathematical models and techniques for predicting such behavior. These subjects are included in the areas of interest and study for the new lab, where exercises will include "data visualization" or the visualization of databases of complex relations to make sense of data. The studies in the Lab will reflect the needs of the industry and businesses.

SAS Turkey General Manager Hakan Erdemli said: "This project is critical to us in two ways: First, we are excited that the lab will be addressing the needs of the industry and businesses, and will undoubtedly produce high-quality work that will make significant contributions. Secondly, SAS is in full support of universities dealing with data and analytics, which have a sizeable presence in business and will continue to expand its influence, so that students can gain this vision before they graduate. I am fully confident that we will achieve greatness in both areas."

Lab director Associate Professor Burçin Bozkaya noted that Big Data Analytics is continuously expanding in importance and applications worldwide, and that the Lab was an exemplary first initiative of academia-business partnership in Big Data in Turkey. Dr. Bozkaya said that SAS' support to the Lab would enable companies to conduct their big data analytics research in the Lab more effectively, and that they were delighted to receive assistance from SAS in all business and data analytics training programs offered at Sabancı University from the undergraduate to the PhD level.

About the Big Data Behavioral Analysis and Visualization Lab
Big data analysis is becoming more important and widely available every day. Prior to the foundation of the lab, Sabancı University, MIT Media Lab and the leading financial companies collaborated to conduct studies on this subject. When these studies yielded positive results, it was decided to continue research within a larger and more comprehensive Lab.

Sabancı University will work with faculty and researchers of the MIT Media Lab Human Dynamics Group in the Big Data Behavioral Analysis and Visualization Lab.

The big data analytics work in the Lab will explain the behavior of individuals, social groups and consumers in different settings by mathematical models and relations. Models and findings acquired as a result of these studies will have the potential to help associated groups, industry analysts and executives to create demos and prototypes for developing new business models. The results will also be applicable to business. There is also the possibility of obtaining findings and results that will be closely relevant to the academic world in terms of fundamental research.

About SAS
SAS is a global leader in busness analytics software and services, and the largest independent solution provider in business intelligence. SAS helps its clients improve their performance with over 75,000 configurations and creates value for them by enabling them to make quicker and more accurate decisions. In short, SAS has been introducing people to THE POWER TO KNOW worldwide since 1976.

Istanbul Policy Center-Sabanci University-Stiftung Mercator Initiative and the Centre for Turkey Studies (CEFTUS) organized a roundtable meeting on “Post-Election Turkey” on Friday, January 15.

In the morning session of the meeting, Lord William Wallace, Lord Peter Hain, and Ersin Kalaycıoğlu shared their thoughts on the election results, domestic dynamics, and the discussions on new constitution making in Turkey. The session was moderated by Bill Park.

Bill Park, Fuat Keyman and Dilek Kurban discussed the Kurdish question, regional dynamics, and foreign policy in the second session moderated by Senem Aydın-Düzgit. The talks were followed by an interactive discussion with participants.

Invent A New Future Challenge is a global case competition of 3M

If selected for the first round of competition, you will have the opportunity to compete in an actual 3M case competition in your country in March or April. The top two finalists will be flown to the United States in July 2016 for the global case competition finals at 3M’s World Headquarters. The final winners will have bragging rights, lunch with 3M leaders and a six-month mentorship with a 3M senior leader, and all participants will gain an unforgettable experience!

To apply: http://www.3m.com/INF2016/ 

To communication Career Office of Sabancı University: career@sabanciunivedu

The interdisciplinary SUTAB (Sabancı University Tissue Ablating Bubbles) Project implemented by internationally recognized Sabancı University faculty members Ali Koşar and Devrim Gözüaçık received the 2015 Elginkan Foundation Technology Award.  The aim of the project is to integrate SUTAB, a patented device based on hydrodynamic cavitation, into an endoscopic device, testing it in medical applications and organizing the commercial design and development of the device while improving it for biomedical treatment.

From left to right: Devrim Gözüaçık - Ali Koşar

Ali Koşar, Asıf Şabanoviç, Devrim Gözüaçık, Hüseyin Üvet, Mustafa Ünel and Sinan Ekici are the faculty members in the project team.  Cenk Kığ and Özlem Oral are the postdoctoral researchers, and Ayşe Ilgınoğlu, Canberk Sözer, Dilara Yılmaz, Gökhan Alcan and Morteza Ghorbani are working as graduate students in the  project. Doğan Üzüşen, Muhsincan Şeşen, Yavuz Perk and Zeynep Itah were former graduate students working in  the project. 

Elginkan Foundation established in 2006 'Turkish Culture Research and Technology Awards Program ‘for the purpose of assessment, encouragement and integration into the Turkish society of researches, works and services towards Turkish culture, and technology and industrial applications. This program is prepared based on first and second clauses of article 2 of the Elginkan Foundation Deed concerning the Purposes of the Foundation, which are defined as 'To search our cultural values, customs, traditions and spiritual values that raised us in our culture, and our Turkish language, support, protect, keep alive and promote researches', and 'To encourage activities in Science, Technology and Education areas'. The Technology Award is given to a researcher or researcher group, who has provided valuable contributions to the technology in real terms by developing a new product, technique or technology based production processes.

2015 - 2016 Spring Term Dormitory Fees and Payments

The dormitory fees for our undergradute and graduate students in the 2015 - 2016 Academic Year Spring Semester are listed below, and are required to be paid to Akbank brunches with company code '815 under the ATS' (Subscription Payment System) between the dates 2016 January 18 and January 22. Under this system, you must provide first your student number (example 00012345), name and surname for access to the amount you are required to pay, which will then be collected in cash. The Artı Para accounts opened for payment of tuition fees in instalments cannot be used for dormitory fees.

Dormitory fee payment dates which specified the above are involves the students who are staying dormitory during Fall Semester and will stay on Spring Semester.

The students who want to stay in dormitory on Spring Semester are can display their dormitory application result on bannerweb.sabanciuniv.edu at 27^th of January, they can make their dormitory fee payment between 27^th of January and 29^th of January.

Dormitories will be open through the semester break.

We wish you a good holiday.

Dormitory Management

2015 – 2016 Academic Year Spring Semester Dormitory Fees / Per Person (VAT included)

Undergraduate students:

4 person study rooms   1.900 TL

4 person rooms            2.900 TL

2 person rooms            4.250 TL

Graduate students:

2 person rooms            4.250 TL

1 person rooms            5.500 TL

Studio apartments (Hall F-G)    5.750 TL

Students entering dormitories for the first time are required to pay a deposit fee of 850 TL.

January 13th ELAE result code explanations are as follows:

SL (Satisfactory in the ELAE): indicates students who have received the required grade or above in the January 13th ELAE and who have gained the right to start their faculty studies as Spring (irregular) Freshman in the 2015-2016 Spring Semester.

EL: (Exempt from the ELAE): indicates students who are exempt from the January 13th ELAE. These students have already gained the right to start their faculty courses in the 2015-2016 Spring Semester.

UL (Unsatisfactory in the ELAE): indicates students who have not been able to obtain the required grade in the ELAE.

NA (Non-attendance): indicates students who did not attend the exam and is equivalent to a “UL” grade.

Grade bands are as below:

Postgraduate candidates who have taken the January 13th ELAE will be informed of their results by their faculties.

A Placement Exam will be given to inactive/prepared outside students who want to continue at FDY on the 18th of January at 9 a.m. They should contact the SL Directorate on the 15th of January by 4 p.m. latest.

Please see the link for your ELAE results.

We wish you success in your studies,

The School of Languages Directorate

Project Green Store is the ultimate, real selling experience in which teams from Turkey’s best universities will compete with their self designed, self built and self managed Green Stores at their own campus.

For further information: http://www.projectgreenstore.com/

Professor Bahri Yilmaz has been granted by Alexander von Humboldt Foundation to spend four months  at the German Institute for International and Security (SWP) in Berlin as a Visiting Fellow.

The topic of research proposal is :"Institutions and Economic Performance: Why Turkey has failed?".