In North Cyprus currently we have over 101,000 students studying at 16 Universities of which 14 are local and 2 are branches of Middle East Technical University in Ankara and Istanbul Technical University in Istanbul. 87% of our students are overseas students from more than 135 different countries, 55% are from Turkey and 13% are local Turkish Cypriot students. Overseas student number, which was about 2,500 in 2009-2010 academic year, increased by more than 35 times to reach 88,000 in the current academic year.
Considering that North Cyprus population is around 320,000, we have 1 higher education student out of 3 people walking on the streets of our island. Universities in North Cyprus and their programs are all recognized by the National Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports and the Higher Education, Planning, Accreditation and Coordination Council (YODAK). Students from Turkey are recruited to the programs in our Universities through the Central Placement Examination organized by the Higher Education Council (YOK) in Turkey. The placements are made to the programs which are accredited by YODAK and YOK after a thorough examination. Thus all of our programs and our Universities are accredited by YOK through the same process as the programs and the Universities in Turkey.