Scholarship Opportunity for Future Textile Engineers as Minimum Wage
The textile and ready-to-wear sectors, which have a 12 percent share in Turkey’s total exports and are among the most important sectors of the country with exports of 28.5 billion dollars and a foreign trade surplus of approximately 20 billion dollars, offer scholarships to the textile engineers of the future. It was announced that the scholarship amount to be provided to students who prefer the relevant departments of universities and meet the criteria will be over 20 million TL this year.
In 2019, the Textile Engineering Scholarship Program, which was initiated by ITKIB under the leadership of the Textile and Ready-to-Wear Exporters’ Associations within the framework of the protocol signed with the Higher Education Council with the support of the Ministry of Trade, and has provided scholarships to more than 350 students so far, aims to reach a total of 500 scholars as of this year. While great steps have been taken for the future of the textile industry with this program, which makes significant contributions to the educational lives and career development of students, it was announced that the annual budget of the scholarship program is over 20 million TL. While this scholarship program provides significant financial support to students, the program offers scholarship opportunities to all students who meet the sufficient success criteria, without any limitation in the number of students. Those ranked in the top 10 thousand will receive the minimum wage, those ranked between 10 thousand and 20 thousand will receive 70% of the minimum wage, those ranked between 20 thousand and 50 thousand will receive 50% of the minimum wage, and those ranked between 50 thousand and 80 thousand will receive %40 of the minimum wage.
Students who benefit from the scholarship program, who are able to voluntarily participate in internships in the textile and ready-to-wear industry starting from the first year, can choose to do internships in the fields they want to specialize in the third and fourth years. ITKIB provides support for the places where students want to do their internships. In this way, students can increase their experience in the sector and prepare for the business life after graduation in a better equipped way. Students who graduate from textile engineering departments can work in all production stages of the textile and ready-to-wear industries. Textile engineers, who can take part in every process of manufacturing from yarn to fabric, from dyeing and finishing to ready-to-wear clothing, can also operate in departments such as production planning, sales and marketing. By working in an integrated manner with disciplines such as textile engineering, chemical engineering, industrial engineering and mechanical engineering, they can have a wide range of jobs.
27.4% of Textile Engineers are Employed Before Graduation
Turkey’s second largest exporting sector, textile and ready-to-wear clothing, has a share of over 12 percent of Turkey’s total exports. With 28.5 billion dollars of exports and 20 billion dollars of foreign trade surplus, the sectors that bring the most foreign currency to Turkey also employ more than 1 million people. The annual production of these sectors reaches 80 billion dollars. More than 30 thousand enterprises operate in the textile and garment industry, including some of the largest denim, fabric, technical textile and fiber production facilities in Europe. Tens of thousands of exporter companies operating across Turkey face major problems in accessing qualified textile engineers. According to the data from the Presidential Human Resources Office, 27.4% of Textile Engineers are employed before graduation. For this reason, students participating in the scholarship program are promised that if they cannot find a job after graduation, all support will be provided if they apply to any Textile and Ready-to-Wear Exporters Association operating throughout Turkey.
Training Textile Engineers with Job Guarantee
In Turkey, 14 universities with textile engineering departments host students who benefit from the scholarship program. Prestigious universities such as Istanbul Technical University, Marmara University, Ege University, Dokuz Eylül University, Uludağ University, Gaziantep University, Pamukkale University, Çukurova University, Süleyman Demirel University, Namık Kemal University, Erciyes University, Kahramanmaraş Sütçü İmam University, Uşak University and Adıyaman University are among the institutions included in the program. There are more than 500 quotas in total in the textile engineering departments of 14 universities, and scholarships are provided to all students who qualify, with no limit on the number of scholarships.
