On the 16^th, 18^th and 20^th October 2014 the British Council Turkey organised the Education UK Days, a series of large scale public student recruitment events, in Istanbul and Ankara. While previous events have been held in Istanbul, this was the first time that the programme had been extended to include Ankara. The first day in Istanbul organised in conjunction with college counsellors from a number of prestigious Istanbul high schools and was focused on the undergraduate market; the second Istanbul date and the Ankara date were focused on both postgraduate and undergraduate markets. The purpose of these events was to promote education opportunities in the UK.

2000 visitors were able to meet 27 UK institutions on the first day and 44 UK institutions on the second day in Istanbul and 28 UK institutions in Ankara, representing an increase in both visitors and institutions in comparison to the prior event, alongside a number of key UK and Turkish stakeholders working in partnership with the British Council. These stakeholders were The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey, the Turkish Council of Higher Education, UK Visas and Immigration, UCAS, the Jean Monnet Scholarship Programme, IELTS and Chevening Scholarships. Additionally, the event was supported by Caffè Nero Turkey and Kariyer.net, Turkey’s largest online job portal. The presence of these stakeholders allowed the British Council to hold an event that was unique for both visitors and participating institutions. Feedback from stakeholders, attending institutions and visitors was very positive and any criticisms will be considered ahead of future events.

A seminar programme ran throughout the three days of the event. These covered a variety of topics such as university applications, scholarship opportunities, subject specific information and visa information. These seminars received overwhelmingly positive feedback from visitors.

Highlights from the event

• 46 UK Higher Education institutions (43 Universities + 3 FE colleges) attended
• 2,000 highly engaged visitors
• Almost 1,300 participants, 42 seminars were delivered in various subjects about studying in the UK
• Attracted 70,365 visitors to the event microsite. Total page view: 140,370
• 1,000 people participated in our online competition
• In partnership with Caffé Nero our re-tweet campaign had 835 re-tweets

A promotional video of the event is available to watch here: https://vimeo.com/120801977