Koç School
 | This article contains weasel words: vague phrasing that often accompanies biased or unverifiable information. |
| The Ram School | |
|---|---|
| File:Logokoc.gif | |
| Location | |
Istanbul Turkey | |
| Information | |
| Type | Private, coeducational, bilingual, boarding |
| Established | 1988 |
| General Director | Tony Paulus |
| Number of students | 1140 (Elementary School), 880 (High School) |
| Color(s) | Red and white |
| Athletics | Volleyball, Basketball, Football, Badminton, Track and Field, Table Tennis, Tennis. |
| Mascot | Ram (Koç means ram in Turkish.) |
| Website | www.kocschool.k12.tr |
The Koç School is a private high school in Istanbul, Turkey. It was founded by one of Turkey's wealthiest businessmen Vehbi Koç and is currently under the umbrella of Vehbi Koç Foundation, which also has more schools around Turkey. The school opened in 1988. Since then, Koc School admits its students based on their achievements on the nationwide examination for high schools in Turkey. Since 1994 it applies the IB program and is considered[citation needed] one of the most prestigious high schools in Turkey.
General information
The Koç School is a bilingual high and elementary school, fully accredited by the Turkish Ministry of Education and is a member of the European Council of International Schools (ECIS) and the National Association of College Admissions Counselors (NACAC).
History
Founded in 1988 by the Vehbi Koç Foundation, The Koç School has quickly become one of Turkey's most selective and competitive university preparatory schools. In the Private High Schools Entrance Exam in Turkey, Koç School generally ranks the 2nd or 3rd in terms of its entrance score (ranked second in 2006[1]). The Koç School is the first school in Turkey to offer the IB program; which it had started applying in 1994. With the introduction of the IB program, many students started applying for overseas educational institutes with high reputation. Koç students have been accepted into universities such as Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Princeton and many other prominent educational institutes and the number of students seeking overseas education increased. The school's Turkish university entrance success is also considerable: general student achievement is among the top when considered with other similar high schools [2]. In fact in 2000, the top scorer of ÖSS was a Koç School graduate [3]. In the 2006 ÖSS, 19 Koc students were in the top 1000 of over 1.500.000 attendants[citation needed].
Mission and vision
The Koç School's official website defines the school's mission and vision as follows:
Mission:
Koç School is a Turkish school with a global perspective. Our multi-cultural academic community, innovative methodology, and coherent K-12 bilingual program engage all students in developing their intellectual and human qualities so that they will become confident, ethical leaders and responsible citizens of Turkey and of the world community.
Vision:
The goal of Koç School is to be respected nationally and internationally as a model K-12 school, offering an educational program of the highest academic and ethical standards.
Campus and facilities
The Koç School offers boarding for seven days a week, and dorms are located adjacent to academic buildings on a 750 acre campus on the eastern outskirts of Istanbul, near Tuzla.Tuzla is approximately 30 minutes to city center by car, and is developing rapidly with an airport nearby and the Formula 1 race track, Istanbul Park.
The most important facilities in the high school are the Suna Kıraç Library, which is one of the biggest high school libraries in Turkey and which was renovated in 2002, the Pyramid (Piramit), which is a student center/lounge, the Atakan Demirseren Hall, an auditorium with nearly 900 people capacity (which will be renovated in 2007), an open track and field area and a sports center (which also will be renovated in 2007). Dorms, which used to be located in the main school building, were recently built as separate buildings next to the main building due to increased population of the school. The elementary school and its library, along with classrooms were also renovated in 2006.
High school
Academics
Koç School gave its first 4-year high school program graduates in 2006; a year before most of the schools in Turkey. Students choose between IB or a non-IB tracks the last 3 years of high school. The IB program in the Koç School is rigorous and integrated with the national curriculum. The Koç School is also the IB coordinator in Istanbul.
Each year, approximately 40% of students in the Koç School prefer to continue their educational lives in overseas universities. The school's Overseas College Guidance Office is strong, considered as one of the best in Turkey.
The Koç School is a bilingual school in Turkish and English but also offers the option of a second language; French or German.
The school is especially successful in its IB courses, with a strong social sciences and literature program. Students encounter world classics, philosophers, social concepts at a very early stage. The teaching of history and social sciences is objective and comprehensive unlike many high schools in Turkey. Science classes also provide challenging learning incidents for the students with the experiments done in the labs and projects. However the school can be considered poor in preparing the students to ÖSS due to its focus on creating individuals that can think, analyze and has interest areas. Still, it had many students that achieved high scores in ÖSS.
There are also many electives in the areas of Arts, Languages and Sports.
Extracurriculars
It is compulsory for each student to join a student club or a sports activity offered at school. The school has many facilities for sports, and the school's football, basketball and other teams win successes in tournaments. The school has over 50 clubs, some of them being international ones such as SEMEP or MUN. Some of the other available extra-curricular activities are, ceramics, chess, jewellery design, librarianship, social awareness raising related activities, voluntary social works, philosophy, Atatürk's thinking and principles, athletics, American football, soccer, tennis, volleyball, badminton, basketball, table tennis, science club, model aircraft making, theatre, journals, music, visual arts, folk dance, modern dance... Every student has to pick one of these activities at the beginning of each semester and has to regularly attend its meetings and activities.
The school has a growing number and an increasing quality of publications, among them are literary magazines like Boyut, Fanzin and Mindscapes, a two-week newspaper T.A.W.A, and a philosophic writings journal.
Koc School is also impressive in its yearly Talent Show in which students compete with each other in different categories, and also RamFest an annual music and arts festival where there are participants from many different schools in Istanbul. Yet, students are critical of the teacher involvement in the organisation of RamFest.
"MUNDP".conference is the only Model United Nations Development Program conference in the world, held by Koc School students each year.[4]
Koc School Student Council is also a very popular and a strong entity in school culture. Even though it is criticized of its lack of ability to effect school politics (an example would be the abolishing of Courtyard and building a pyramid instead which was disliked by many of the students during the time) concerning discipline code, student freedoms etc., it is an active, hard-working student organization. The elections are very important and are cared about deeply.
Science Fair is organized with the contributions of Koc School students and other Istanbul high schools every year. The outcomes of student research projects, experiments and from time to time basic inventions are exhibited.
At the end of each academic year, extra-curricular awards are given to students according to the feedbacks of the teachers.
Traditions
Although Koc School is a newly established school, it is promising with its traditions adhered by its student body and alumni.
One of the school traditions is the school parties. Each year there are about 3-4 school parties, in which students spend most of the time eating from the delicious food served at Koc School for the day by famous cafes in Istanbul, and dancing in the auditorium or Piramit. It is seen as a dissappointment and a decline in school culture that the school parties are losing its popularity and rather parties in Istanbul are preferred by the students. There are also many concerts during the year by rock-bands or pop singers.
A notable tradition in the school which also inspired the establishment of the school newspaper T.A.W.A is the phrase 'This announcement was about.....' repeated by students in the Monday and Friday, opening and closing ceremonies at the Atakan Demirseren Hall (more commonly AD or auditorium). On Monday after the ceremony and on Friday before the ceremony, announcements regarding school activities, teams, exams are given by the faculty and students. Since the school has international teachers and students, announcements are made in both English and Turkish. Over the years, T.A.W.A has become a cult, listened with smiling faces in the auditorium at each time a student repeats the phrase.
Field Days, usually held on a warm autumn day, is an indispensable part of school spirit. Students compete with each other in athletic sports, form their own teams and are awarded according to their performances at the end of the day. It is also very common to see some students eating dürüm all day instead of participating in the activities!
'No uniform days' are days when students are permitted to wear clothes other then their uniforms. Students pay an amount about 1-2 YTL this day and the collected money is either used in helping poor, homeless people or used for the student council budget to organise student activities.
School trips to cities and historical places in Turkey, such as Ankara, Çanakkale, Capadoccia are organised each year. Many students enjoy these trips and return with gossips and newly formed friendships. Seniors go to Bodrum after the ÖSS to have fun.
Talent Show and RamFest are among the other school traditions, with both of them held in spring. Many students become contestants of Talent Show in their years at Koç School. Talent Show awards, which are given to successful performers by a jury composed of teachers, students, alumni and usually a celebrity, are highly respected and celebrated by the student body and faculty.
SpringFest is another festival held in school campus near the end of the academic year. Alumni, current students, friends, families, faculty come together and enjoy several activities in the festival.
Despite the decreased amount of energy and attention students give to school related activities in the last few years, each year a musical was performed in this school, with The Wonderful Wizard of Oz in 1999 being among the greatest performances. Actors and actresses were chosen among many applicants and the musical would be performed after months of preparations. A similar project is prepared, named Leader of the Pack.
Student perspectives
| This article contains weasel words: vague phrasing that often accompanies biased or unverifiable information. |
 | The neutrality of this article is disputed. |
The students usually have mixed feelings about their school; some find the general academic and social atmosphere of the school inadequate. The Koc School administration has historically played a divisive rather than reconciliatory role in controversies.
The defenders of the Koc school cite student admissions into prestigious U.S. universities such as Yale, Harvard, Stanford and Princeton and the school is proud of its strong Overseas College Guidance Office.[5] However, many students are critical of the organizational mistakes of the office.
Especially in the latter years of high school education, the students undergo a rigorous academic program. The quality and variety of extra-curricular activities offered and the rigorousness of the academic program is appreciated by many of its students and alumni. Yet, even though the school administration works with a provost within a selective process to choose teachers both from Turkey and abroad, there sometimes are disputes between the students that the teachers have lacking communication skills and inadequate knowledge about the subjects they teach. Still, the school provides a truly international faculty with teachers from Britain, India, Australia, Russia, U.S., Canada, New Zealand and Turkey. Although Koc School offers its students a rigorous, strong academic program, fulfillment of this education is very difficult when the Turkish education system forces students to attend dersane and study for the multiple choice Turkish Universities Entrance Exam.
The critics, many students and alumni amongst them, on the other hand allege draconian measures by the administration (particularly about the dress code), a lack of "school spirit" and more importantly a superficial school ethos that is more geared towards advertising the school's name and prestige as opposed to aiming for genuine student happiness. For instance, it is common for a student to submit her write-ups for the year book but then find later after the publication of the year book that her write-ups were censored without any prior notice. (Some students express their discontent about the school in their write-ups and the administration vehemently censures such texts in a zeal to protect school's image.) In general the school lacks the camaraderie and warmth of other more traditional high schools. Its location, extremely distant from the city center, stifles the social life, as many students commute an hour or longer everyday. On the other hand, many students claim that the time they spend in the school buses gives them the opportunity of forming strong friendships and sharing. It is very common to see students hanging with friends from school buses in the lunch periods or break times.
Alumni
Koc School's notable alumni include Cengiz Pehlevan,[6]< who got the first place in 2000 University Entrance Exam (OSS), Tansa Mermerci, socialite and fashion designer and Berkun Oya, artist and playwright.
Elementary school
Koç Elementary School was founded in 1998. It gave its first graduates in 2002. It's one of the best elementary schools in Turkey as it prepares its students to high school, especially in language area. Graduates of the elementary school have the right of continuing to Koç High School, and take an exam to skip the Preparation year. If they score over 55% in this exam, they are automatically enrolled in 9th grade of the high school. If they score below 55%, they have to study 1 year of extensive English preparation.
References and notes
- ^ "İşte Özel Okul Puanları (Article in Turkish)". Retrieved 02 April.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help); Unknown parameter|accessyear=ignored (|access-date=suggested) (help) - ^ "Özel Liselerde Anadolu Kaplanları (Article in Turkish)". Retrieved 02 April.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help); Unknown parameter|accessyear=ignored (|access-date=suggested) (help) - ^ "ÖSS Results Announced". Retrieved 13 Feb.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help); Unknown parameter|accessyear=ignored (|access-date=suggested) (help) - ^ "BM gibi Koç Lisesi". Retrieved 13 Feb.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help); Unknown parameter|accessyear=ignored (|access-date=suggested) (help) - ^ "Interview with three Koc students accepted to U.S. institutions". Retrieved 13 Feb.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help); Unknown parameter|accessyear=ignored (|access-date=suggested) (help) - ^ "ÖSS'nin şampiyonları anlatıyor". Retrieved 13 Feb.
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