Teachers, school leaders and academics gather at Istanbul Cambridge International Day

Over 230 school leaders and teachers attended the annual Cambridge International Day, which this year was hosted in Kabataş High School in collaboration with Cambridge University

The event was opened by special guests: Ömer Faruk Yelkenci, Istanbul Provincial Director of National Education and Ahmet Hamdi Usta, Istanbul Deputy Governor in charge of Education.

Janet Williams-Ipek, Vice President of Cambridge Associate Schools, welcomed delegates to Kabatas High School, and in turn Peter Monteath, Regional Director, Europe, thanked the Associate, Tarabya British Schools, and the host school for their hard work and hospitality.

The theme of this year’s event was ‘Learning to Learn’, and the day included keynote addresses from Paul Ellis, Head of Teaching and Learning Strategy at Cambridge International, and from Dr Andrea Greve of the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit at the University of Cambridge.

After lunch a student panel, chaired by Prof Dr Soner Yıldırım of Middle East Technical University, explored students’ attitudes to learning of the future. To close the day, teachers were able to attend workshops exploring the curriculum and assessment within specific Cambridge programmes and subjects.

The Cambridge International Day offers the opportunity for networking and relevant professional development to its 50 Cambridge School in Turkey. They also received an update from Cambridge International and a reminder of the latest teaching resources, displayed by Cambridge’s core publishing team during the breaks.

Burcu Benderli, Senior Manager, Turkey, the Netherlands, the Balkans & Wider Europe said: 'Our Cambridge Day is growing steadily every year with this our biggest yet – which reflects the steady growth of Cambridge schools in Turkey. We now have over 50 registered Cambridge schools in Turkey with another six schools that are very close to completing the registration process. Schools are using a variety of Cambridge programmes and syllabuses in building their school's curriculum and I’m proud that, on average, each school is offering 12 Cambridge syllabuses to their students.

'Turkey is an exciting country with many different local and global factors influencing its growth. As a country, it is clearly an up-and-coming global player. The curricula that our schools are building are designed to equip the young people of Turkey with the knowledge but, more importantly, the skills to succeed in this fast-changing world. Enormous credit must go to the teachers in these schools whose investment in their learners continues to deliver outstanding results, and develops young people who are truly ready for the world.

'Today’s event has been incredibly successful and I would like to thank Horizon, our Associate, the team from Tarabya British Schools who have run the event so professionally, and also colleagues in Cambridge, including Zoë Neville-Smith, our Senior Marketing Manager for Europe, and Charlotte Crochet, our Events Assistant, who have been a great support to the event.'