Turkish Schools a Continuation of Historical Responsibility
Relations between Turkey and Azerbaijan are an important link not only in economy and trade, but also in education and culture. Thousands of Azerbaijani teens have graduated from Turkish universities and are now working at different places and positions in the country and thousands of students are receiving an education from both public and private companies in Azerbaijan.
Turkish high schools and the Turkish Caucasus University have become like brands in Azerbaijan. Of the first 1,000 top scoring students in the university entrance exam, 118 registered at Caucasus University. Turkish educators volunteering in Azerbaijan are actually continuing a historical responsibility. For, after the Ottoman-Turkish army liberated Baku from Russian, English and Armenian forces in 1918, teachers serving in the military first set up schools. Turkish schools that are as old as Azerbaijan's independence are playing an important role in the country's struggle for a bright future. Late President Heydar Aliyev had described the success of the Turkish schools as “a legendary triumph.”
We are approaching the final round of the Turkish Olympiads, which are organized by Turkish schools and which function as bridges of peace on behalf of Turkey in more than 130 countries. Among the students that attended the Olympiads last year from more than 100 countries, an Azerbaijani student named Hatice Alizade won first place with the song she sang in a Black Sea accent. Turkish schools have a special place in Azerbaijan because Turkish schools first opened there in the early 1990s and spread to the rest of the world from there.
Moreover, the schools stimulated the struggle for the future, a struggle that was left incomplete in 1920. While in Çanakkale you can find the grave of an 18-year-old Baku soldier named Hasanoğlu İbrahim, in Baku you can find the graves of soldiers from Aksaray, Diyarbakir and Erzurum. The Turkish army lost 1,130 soldiers in Azerbaijan in 1918. But as a result of the Armenian-Azerbaijani War, which began in 1918, Baku was freed from occupation and Azerbaijan won its independence at the time. Among the soldiers that joined the Caucasus Muslim army in Baku were teachers, who immediately set up schools in Gence after Baku was liberated and they started educating Azerbaijani youth.
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