(Hürriyet Newspaper, 15 April 2017)
//ed. note: on the eve of a vote that may bring one-man rule to
Turkey, herewith a benevolent example that probably won't be
replicated.//
Today we are at the one and only school in Ovacık village in Gebze
district. The 19 students at the school, which is 70 kilometers east
of Istanbul, are of various ages. The school's principal, only teacher
and custodian is Hakan Mucuk, who has made the school a place
where students rush to come to.
There are pictures of Scooby Doo and Sylvester on the garden walls.
First graders are seated in one arm of the u-shaped classroom and
2nd, 3rd and 4th graders fill the rest of the seats. Mucuk explains
that "our means are limited. We don't have a laboratory or a library
like schools in cities. A visiting teacher came one day and said 'I've
been to many schools but here the students are respectful and they
help one another' I was proud to hear this. I went on social media
and said here's what we need - in two or three hours we were wanting
for nothing."
As for his teaching philosophy, Mucuk stated that "teachers in the
cities are uneasy because of pressure from parents and the school
administration. The parents here don't put pressure on their kids
like they do in the cities. This has given us some freedom, both
myself and the children. They may not learn a couple of things they
would in the city but I want them to know themselves, discover their
abilities and love animals. Two of my students want to be farmers
when they grow up, so let them be the best farmers. When the weather
gets nice we'll plant our own vegetables and fruits."
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