Master Student in Chemical Engineering and Applied Chemistry Department.

 

A citizen of Egypt, Ahmed Eid is one of the international students of Atilim University making our country proud in international rankings and taking firm steps toward becoming a world university with international students from all around the world. After graduating from the School of Pharmacy in Egypt, Ahmed decided to take one step further towards improving his future career as a pharmacist.

Back in Egypt, he worked as an Industrial Pharmacist. However, as a pharmacist he lacked engineering skills to deal with the different technical problems he faced during his employment period at the pharmaceutical factory. That is why he started looking for a special program to learn basic engineering in addition to improving his chemistry skills as a pharmacist.

Ahmed told us that he contacted several universities until he discovered that Atilim University’s programmes in Chemical Engineering and Applied Chemistry Department. After getting his acceptance letter from our university, Ahmed started learning how to communicate in the Turkish language and started looking for a job by contacting companies even before moving to Turkey. As a result, he successfully found a job as a translator in one of our partnering companies, Studyhane, an educational consultant company.

The international experience which is Ahmed having at our university helped him to have new friends from different countries and get to know new cultures and lifestyles. He was surprised by the hospitality of the Turkish people after arriving in Turkey. Ahmed is currently one of the most successful students at our university with an astonishing GPA in his courses. Speaking 4 languages already made his integration easy in a new country.

Ahmed told us that the teaching staff are of great knowledge and our laboratories have all the devices he needs for the completion of his thesis. He plans to start his PhD degree at our university after completing his master’s degree.

• School of Business, Undergraduate Student | 23 years old •

Chris was born in Vienna in 1993 and lived in the Netherlands and Bulgaria besides Austria. He decided to study at Atılım University upon recommendation when they came to Turkey because of his father’s appointment in 2013. Chris is also taking the journalism course and conducting a study on the distribution of international students by countries. He was a registered player in the basketball team of his high school in Bulgaria. He is planning to found a company on the recycling of old vehicles in Bulgaria, after completing his compulsory military service in Austria for 6 months. He speaks English and German besides Bulgarian. He also knows Russian, Spanish, French and Dutch. Chris says that international students build good friendships with Turkish students and this makes him happy.

• Undergraduate Student in Software Engineering •

When I was accepted by the university that I had preferred, I thought I would overcome the concerns in my head about expectations, goals and achievements. In fact, I realized that it was just the beginning and I had to study harder. I live by an adage by a family member: "We reach the most favorable knowledge through science and science makes us strong”. I was born in Illinois, United States in 1992. Before coming to Atılım University, I studied with Dr. Roger Knowles and Dr. Minjoon Kouh at the Department of Neuroscience and Computing at Drew University in the USA. In addition, my hobbies involve basketball, fencing, baseball and football. I had to take a break in sports, as I sprained my ankle but I want to continue. I could not imagine that studying Software Engineering could be so entertaining. Even if courses and exams may sometimes be harder than students’ expectations, I think our instructors aims to educate us better by pushing us. The campus environment and the Atılım family have embraced me well since I came to Atılım University. I am really happy to be a member of this family.

• Master Student of Software Engineering •

One of our international students coming from Eritrea, Yasmin Tesfaldet Gebreyesus was born in Asmara. She was graduated from the Department of Computer Engineering, Eritrea Institute of Technology in Eritrea located in Northeast Africa.

The study on face recognition techniques conducted by her undergraduate thesis group ranked in the top three in the technology contest organized by Eritrea National Youth Organization. Before coming to Turkey, Yasmin Tesfaldet Gebreyesus worked in various software projects in public and private institutions for 3 years.

After being granted a scholarship via the program Scholarship Students of Turkey, she preferred Atılım University and was admitted to the Software Engineering Thesis Master Program. She has been in Turkey since August 2015. She attended a Turkish course for 9 months and learned our language very well as a scholar of the program.

Starting her master studies in September 2016, Yasmin passed her courses with flying colors and wishes to sustain her success while writing her master thesis. Currently, she is working on “Processing Social Media Streaming Data Using Big Data Frameworks” with her thesis advisor Asst. Prof. Dr. Ziya Karakaya.     

The opinions of Yasmin on Turkey, Ankara and Atılım University are:

“I love Turkey very much, especially Ankara. At first, it was difficult to adapt as I had come from a small country. But people are very sincere and helpful so living here became easier for me.

“I made many friends at the University and we help each other all the time.

“Our instructors, too, are quite skilled and hardworking. Therefore, I am happy to be at Atılım".

 

• Undergraduate Student of Interior Architecture •

I am from Libya and studying as a freshman in the Department of Interior Design, Faculty of Fine Arts, Design and Architecture, Atılım University. My adventures in Ankara started at the School of Medicine at Hacettepe University, 4 years ago.

When I realized that I was interested in and fond of the field of interior design, I quit medical education and started to look for the steps that I could take for a good level of education in this field. I visited the campus upon the recommendation by a friend of mine at Atılım University and became reconciled to the university. When I saw the environment at the University and contacted the instructors, students and other members of the Atılım Family, everything became clearer and I chose Atılım University. I am very happy with my preference.

I could not speak a word of Turkish when I came to Turkey; however, I did not encounter any difficulty thanks to the help and support of the people here. Turkish is a very rich and difficult language; it was quite hard and tiring to learn. I really enjoy speaking Turkish now.

I have been to different countries as my father is working in the Embassy of Libya and I have felt out of place in many of them. Take China, for example: China is a very beautiful country with an interesting culture. However, I could not get used to their lifestyle easily. The culture and lifestyle in China were quite different than what I was used to experience, and this made me feel out of place despite the all positive aspects of the country.

But I never felt like that in Turkey because Turkish culture is quite close to mine. The similarity of Turkish culture and the warm attitude of Turkish people helped my get used to the country.

Living in here brought me new habits, especially with food and drinks.  In fact, Turkish cuisine has become my favorite part of Turkish culture. Turkish food has offers authentic and different tastes; for example, kunafah with cheese! Although I wasn’t used to having tea before coming to Turkey, having tea while chatting with friends has now become one of the activities that makes me happy the most.

I’ve always loved dancing, and I attend a tango course in my spare time here. This way, I have a good time and relieve myself from stress.

I am very happy to be in Turkey and I see that I have made a very good decision by choosing Atılım University as I spend time here.

• Freshman Student of International Relations •

I was born in London, England on 19 February 1999. My mother is Irish and father is Turkish. I spent a couple of years of my childhood in London until we suddenly moved to Ankara in order to start a new life in Turkey in 2003.

In the beginning, it was a frightening experience for me to enter a totally new environment all of a sudden. But I got used to my new life here. I started my education in the Primary School of the Embassy of England which offers education in English and education in line with the English curriculum. I went to the UK for my secondary school education in 2011 and returned to Turkey to complete my GCSE and Level A in the Working Group of the Embassy of Pakistan in 2014.

English is my mother tongue that I mostly speak at the University and at home. I have not received formal Turkish education in Turkey but I can understand it more or less in my conversations with other students and my relatives. My Turkish speaking level is still below a certain level in terms of an academic perspective. I hope my friends at Atılım University be understanding and bear with me until I improve my speaking skills and I can help them with English in return.

I decided to study International Relations due to my deep interest in history, politics and current events. I researched the universities in Ankara where education is offered in English. I spoke with the academicians of three universities and applied to all of them. I was accepted by all these universities and chose Atılım University.

I am happy to have chosen Atılım University among others. I am proud of being an international student at Atılım University and cannot imagine myself anywhere else.

All of my instructors sustained their professional attitudes while instilling discipline in the courses, thus I felt that I was in good hands at Atılım. I believe that they will provide us with high quality education. I have already started making friends and I am looking forward to meeting more students.

I feel at home in Ankara, as if I was in London. I want to continue exploring the world and experiencing different cultures in the future.

I was born in Kirkuk, Iraq on 17 January 1991. Kirkuk hosts people with quite different lifestyles and offers a range of culture. Therefore, I found the opportunity to learn 3 different languages until I was 12 and now I can speak 6 languages.

I am a Master Candidate in English Language and Literature and writing English novels and short stories at the same time. Currently, I am working on my first novel “The Twelve Camellias of Bloom”. The novel has not been published yet but you may review a short version of the book on https://mahamadsalahblog.wordpress.com/ if you are interested.

During my stay in Kirkuk I was a volunteer at Kokar, and contributed in many projects for cancer patients. At the end, we managed to make the children smile and raise donations to help them. In fact, I am a photographer. It is my actual hobby. I like taking the pictures of the beauties before my eyes and editing them in an even more beautiful way that other people may see and like.

In addition, I taught English to people of all ages in Iraq and made them enjoy learning English.

As a person of Turkmen origin, I have deep interest in the Turkish culture. I visited Turkey several times but most of them were usually limited to Istanbul. This is the first time in Ankara. I was shocked by the beauty of the city when I first came here, who knew that the sweetest people in the world lived in Ankara? I have always encountered nice things in Ankara so far. I feel at peace and home, not homesick.

I came here for the English Language and Literature Master Program. Atılım University was my first preference and they really embraced me when I wanted to register. I chose Atılım University to guide me to knowledge and I was sure that Atılım would be the university to help me climb up the ranks in the academic field. And I realized that I was right. The academic staff are very knowledgeable and have a good grasp of their field. I have learned many new things that I could use in my stories within a few months. I am looking forward to discover what to learn next.

As soon as my books are published, I will translate them into Turkish and let my amiable Turkish family read them. I will even sign them for the students of Atılım University!