ANKARA

The proportion of women professors employed at Turkish universities has outpaced the average in EU countries, the Turkish Council of Higher Education (YOK) announced on Saturday.

Turkey has 207 higher education institutions, with nearly 8.22 million students and almost 91,000 academics in total.

The ratio of male students in higher education is 51% with over 4.17 million, while that of female students is 49%, increasing from 42% in 2002.

While the number of academics was 74,134 in 2003, this reached 180,065 in 2020, of which 98,404 are men and 81,661 are women. The proportion of women academics exceeds 45%.

Also, there are 51,412 research assistants in Turkey, with 26,352 women and 25,060 men.

Turkey outperforms EU countries

There are 10,011 women professors in Turkey, according to YOK data.

Statistics show that Turkey has a higher proportion of women professors than the EU.

The rate of women professors in the country currently stands at 32.5%, outpacing the bloc average of 20.8%, and is now equivalent to the US value.

With a female faculty member ratio of 45%, Turkey is ahead of the EU average of 41.3% and the US average of 42.5%.

*Writing by Merve Berker