Turkish education minister receives Palestinian pupils

March 21, 2013 - Turkey's National Education Minister Nabi Avci said on Thursday, "Palestine is the name of an honorable and prideful struggle for life." He added, "this struggle will reach victory via works to be held in fields of education and culture." Within the scope of Turkey's Office of Public Diplomacy's program, 35 Palestinian students travelled to Turkey to visit several institutions and visited Minister Avci in Turkish capital Ankara. Avci said, Palestinian people pay high attention to education and said, both direct and indirect oppression mainly effect Palestinian youth, children and teachers. Minister Avci invited Palestinian students to Turkey to continue their higher education and then replied the questions of pupils. Upon the demand of, "vocational education help from Turkey" of a Palestinian student, Avci explained, they are holding works in the field of vocational education in Gaza. Moreover, Avci underlined that they were paying attention to twin Turkish and Palestinian universities and added, he would be holding talks with Anadolu University and Istanbul Bilgi University in this field. Turkish minister noted,helping hands were being given to children, students and youth at the Palestinian refugee camps via governments not directly. He said, Turkey was becoming experienced in this area lately and stressed, Turkish government was reserving a serious source for Syrians who take shelter in the country and that the government was holding a fine organization in the field of education. Avci drew attentions to the lack of awareness about Syria in the world agenda and asked for Palestinian students' support about it. Avci informed students about the educational status of Syrian citizens and said, there were 26,693 pupils receiving education in camps, 1174 Turkish and Arabic teachers were giving education. In addition, 27,221 adults were taking various vocational courses in the camps, he said.  A Palestinian university student Suheda Nisa Kaya asked, "if there is a possibility of exchanging students between two countries via Erasmus system", and Avci replied as saying that apart from systems like Erasmus, Turkey was holding systems like government to government scholarship program and stressed, "We have reciprocal scholarship programs with almost all Arab countries. Between these, we giver the largest part to our Palestinian brother and sisters."