By Apurva Mahajan

University of Maryland students affected by the Turkish and Syrian earthquakes that occurred in February are calling on the administration to listen to those affected by the humanitarian crisis after a lack of university-wide acknowledgement.

The original 7.8 magnitude earthquake hit parts of southern Turkey and northern Syria on Feb. 6, killing over 46,000 people and leaving over 1 million displaced or homeless. Two weeks after the original quake, two more earthquakes struck the region at 6.4 and 5.8 magnitudes respectively.

Onur Cankur, a doctoral computer science major, was in Turkey when the first earthquake struck, though in a part of the country far away from the devastation. Doctoral computer science major Alperen Keles was in the United States, and was able to contact his family and friends as they were not in the region affected.

“I don’t really think that there are a lot of words to capture feelings in such a situation,” Keles said. “My relatives from my father’s side . . . we could not reach some of them for days. I was able to reach my close friends and family, but there are a lot of other people that couldn’t.”

When Cankur returned to the United States, he started a donation campaign with UMD’s Turkish Student Organization, to provide funds to Turkish Philanthropy Funds’ Turkiye Earthquake Relief Fund. So far, TSO has raised over $10,500 for the campaign.

“Part of the donation campaign was not only raising money, but also showing the Turkish community at UMD that people are doing something in this community and they also care,” Cankur said.

Cankur and Keles initially contacted people in the computer science department with the goal of raising awareness about the earthquake and sharing the information for the donation campaign. The pair then tried to get in contact with administration.

Keles personally contacted the Office of the Provost, who referred him to the Office of Student Affairs, who finally sent him to the Office of the President. He inquired as to why a university-wide email  acknowledging the earthquake and the communities affected by it was not sent to the student body, but did not get a response.

Keles said he would have been fine if administration had responded to him and told him they could not send a university-wide email because of policy, but not being involved in the process moving forward after the crisis presented the message to him that administration did not want to listen to what the people affected by it had to say.

“They could have listened to us, they could have pulled us inside the process of decisions. They could have consulted us on what to do. And they could be more transparent in their decisions on why they do what they do,” Keles said. 

The International Student and Scholar Services, which manages 6,000 students at UMD, sent out an initial email on Feb. 6 exclusively to international Turkish and Syrian students.

“ISSS is saddened by the news of the devastating earthquake in southeastern Turkey and northwestern Syria. We understand that some of you may be directly impacted by this disaster, through family or friends. Dealing with a crisis in your home country from abroad is always difficult. In particular, this message is our small gesture of support to each of you and a reminder that you have a community on campus to support you.

We write to reassure you that ISSS advisors are here should you need assistance and support. We are available in the office or by phone, chat and appointment. Also, the Counseling Center provides online services, and we encourage you to contact the Counseling Center for support during this stressful and uncertain time.”

— Feb. 6 ISSS Email

A second, similar message was sent by Georgina Dodge, vice president of diversity and inclusion, Andrea Goodwin, assistant vice principal for student affairs and dean of students and Ross Lewin, associate vice president for international affairs, to the same group of students on Feb. 15, encouraging them to contact ISSS and the Dean of Students Office.

“Approximately 50 people are on the immigration sponsorship of the university with citizenship of Turkey and Syria,” Susan-Ellis Dougherty, director of ISSS, wrote in an email.  “We are located in an area with many diaspora populations, so there are most likely more students at the university that are impacted by this disaster.”

ISSS’s job is to support community members who are using university immigration sponsorship while they are in the U.S., wrote Dougherty.

“If I were the administration . . . I would just call out to the Turkish committee and say, ‘Okay, come talk to us on what you can do,’” Keles said. “In situations like these, you need the victims of the event to tell you what they need. And I think the number one problem has been that it did not happen.” 

Featured image: The administration building on March 1, 2023. Photo by Apurva Mahajan.