15.2.4. Educational programmes on ecosystems

In 2025, METU offered free educational programmes on ecosystems and wild flora and fauna to the local community.

Tür Say! (2025)

Before each Tür Say! survey, participants receive a short training on campus species; they then search designated zones with expert naturalists, who help them identify plants, birds, butterflies and other wildlife. Türkiye's 7th Tür Say! was held on the METU campus on Sunday 25 May 2025, organised by DKM with METU EKOSAM and the EKOSAM Student Club, and was open to anyone who wished to take part.

https://dkm.org.tr/sites/other/dkm/uploads/TurSayODTU_Rapor_2025.pdf

EKOSAM Student Club

The EKOSAM Student Club runs nature-themed activities for students, staff and visitors to raise awareness of the biodiversity of the METU campus. In 2025 these included:

• On 12 May 2025, the EKOSAM Student Club's Nature Education Series hosted Dr. Elif Deniz Ülker, who leads projects in the Biodiversity Programme of the Nature Conservation Centre Foundation (DKM), for the talk 'Effects of Fires on Biodiversity in Mediterranean Ecosystems', on how wildfires change ecosystems and their biodiversity. The talk was open to everyone, with online registration.

• In 12.07.2025, during METU's engineering summer school for high-school students, the EKOSAM Student Club and the METU Bird-Watching Society ran a Tür Say! citizen-science session to build young people's knowledge of and interest in biodiversity: after a short presentation on the nature of the METU campus by the club's nature guides, the students observed the wildlife around the Yüksel Proje building and recorded their observations on iNaturalist.

Sea and Climate School

METU CLIMATE and the Institute of Marine Sciences reached about 2,500 children and young people in the first half of 2025 with interactive training on marine and coastal ecosystems, covering marine biodiversity, marine protected areas, sea turtle conservation and the effects of climate change and pollution on marine ecosystems.