Turkish teachers to be taught Kurdish to bond with students

The National Education Ministry announced that teachers in the predominantly Kurdish southeastern and eastern cities, will be taught basic Kurdish to help them develop better relations with students.

Minister Nabi Avcı told Turkish media that new teacher training will include an intensive Kurdish language course. "They will be taught phrases and sentences to improve relations between the teacher and student, such as sentences to inquire into the health of the student or state of student's family," Avcı said.

Southeastern and eastern Turkey, regions heavily afflicted by a decades-long conflict with the PKK, receive significant financial aid from the government. A renewed campaign of violence by the PKK had triggered fears for a return to the past where attacks were commonplace and civil servants assigned to the regions feared to take office due to a lack of security.

Education is a key component of the government's plan to end decades of terror. Although the government-sponsored reconciliation process to end terrorism and restore the rights of the Kurdish community was frozen due to renewed PKK attacks, the government is determined to keep the schools staffed. A large majority of newly assigned teachers are dispatched to two regions.

Teachers are at the forefront of efforts to bring public services to the regions where literacy rates are low and have been long neglected by past governments amid security concerns. Many ignore the ongoing threat of terrorism by the PKK, which has killed dozens of security officers and civilians since it launched an offensive in southeastern and eastern Turkey this summer after a three-year lull in the violence.