Hüsnü Özyeğin'in Hiç Duymadığımız Gizli Yönleri !

An important example of social entrepreneurship in Turkey is ACEV, the Mother-Child Education Foundation founded by my wife. This foundation was established in 1993, it is 23 years old, and so far it has trained 900,000 mothers and children in preschool education, for the 3-6 age group. They ran the '7 is too late' campaign in Turkey, you might remember that slogan. I think it sparked the Ministry of National Education to pay attention to preschool education. They carried out these works with the Ministry. But of course we have other things too. For example, I built many girls' dormitories in the east. Because I saw that our girls in the east cannot continue school after primary school. There are no high schools or secondary schools in the villages and towns; they have to go to a province or a large district. We built girls' dormitories next to high schools in those provinces and districts. We have 25 girls' dormitories; you would not see them unless you go there: Doğubeyazıt, Ağrı, Malazgirt, Muş, Van, Erzurum, Diyarbakır, Siverek, Kızıltepe, Midyat. And there we saw that only 5% of girls from villages and towns in these provinces continued school after primary school. Now, of the girls staying in our dormitories, 52% go on to college and university after high school. I say we changed the lives of these girls; they become professionals. Because everyone here discusses women's employment in Istanbul, why women cannot find jobs, etc. But everything starts with education. What job can a primary school graduate woman do, understand? Even becoming a worker is hard. We did these things. We built schools in many places where 100 students were studying in one classroom; we supported creating smaller classes.

We also did a rural development project in the east, in the Kavar basin of Tatvan district in Bitlis, a basin consisting of six villages. There, we carried out a model rural development project. As part of this project, we built a school there, perhaps the only school in Turkey that meets its energy needs with solar energy. Then, all computers in the school are connected to our university's library, so children can benefit from the university's facilities if they wish. But we set out to increase the per capita income by a certain amount and also to show social development. ACEV supported women there, provided training on birth control and family planning. At the same time, we planted walnut trees around, they grow ornamental plants, we started beekeeping, and honey production began. The animals were producing milk, but the milk was not being stored, so we built a storage facility. Now a milk factory can come with a tanker and collect the milk without spoiling, ensuring it reaches the market. We found livestock credits from Ziraat Bank, and livestock farming developed. Let me tell you, for example, all our New Year gifts come from products from that village, from the products grown there through the Rural Development Foundation. We also support their marketing.

We also did this in the Ravanda basin of Nizip district in Gaziantep. Different products are grown there, for example, we grow olive oil, olive trees, olive oil, soap making from olive oil, etc. So those are the local products. We have two such village development projects. The Eastern Development Agency took this as an example. At the same time, we provide one-week training at Özyeğin University to the bureaucrats working in the development agencies in the east, related to these projects. Because there is an interesting thing: In Turkey, there are the Ministry of Agriculture and Ziraat Bank to help these villagers and farmers, but the people there cannot reach these bureaucrats. Our role was not only financial but also to create synergy and provide information by connecting them with those bureaucrats.

And of course, there is one more thing I did that is not widely known, which I consider a very important job, as important as founding a university. We established a substance abuse center in Gaziantep. In Gaziantep, there were about 1,000 children aged 15-18 addicted to thinner. They live at most until age 19-20. We set up a center to collect them and rehabilitate them, to free them from addiction. This center is a residential center; about 60 children stay there for 6 to 9 months. We either succeed or fail; they leave and their lives end, but so far I can say we have saved over 100 young people. There are psychologists inside, a sauna, a Turkish bath, they make jewelry, paint, work on stone masonry in the garden. Keeping them occupied is important, not just education. It was a very important undertaking; we transferred it to the Gaziantep Municipality. It is the most expert center on this subject in Turkey because we brought all the experts and doctors from America; they prepared all the materials and trained people there, including doctors. It became a very serious center and continues well with Mayor Fatma Şahin. We are happy about that because continuing something is also very important. We have done other things too, but I will not list them all; we built a cerebral palsy center in Rize, among other things. If I list everything, the night will get long. But as I said, we have touched many people and continue to do so. And of course, the most important thing we did is Özyeğin University.