Academic Program

BHSSciTech does not report student rank. The students’ unweighted GPA is calculated on the basis of examination grades received and the number of hours of classes per week. No extra grades are awarded for science olympiads or project classes. The curriculum is extremely demanding, and the school atmosphere is highly competitive. The program is bilingual and includes elements specially designed by the professors at Bahcesehir University and incorporate undergraduate-level components. Turkish Language and Literature, religion and physical education are taught in Turkish, while all the remaining subjects are taught in English. All students are obliged to work towards the nationally-administered Turkish university entrance exams taken by approximately 2.5 million students across the nation.

All students are required to take a full preparatory year of intensive English, physics, and mathematics before advancing to 9th grade. The students are exposed to more English through their math and science lessons, and various international competitions such as the FIRST LEGO League (FLL), FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC), and International Physics Olympiads (IPhO). Students also take SAT and ACT examinations externally, along with the AP exams, whose courses are currently not offered at our school.

Occasionally, 1-week, intensive, company-sponsored lectures take place throughout the year, such as the Computer Aided Design course offered by Autodesk, Inc.

Specialized Curriculum

Students take 25 hours of compulsory English lessons in their prep year. In addition to this, 100% of prep year students take first-year university physics lectures from Prof. Dimitrov for approximately 20 out-of-school hours per week. It is voluntary for students to continue with these physics lectures after the prep year to join the BHSSciTech Physics Olympiads Program which approximately 25% of students decide to continue with each year. Students also take history of science, computer science, and mathematics —including higher topics like calculus— as a part of their prep-year curriculum. Students are also obliged to prepare a research project for the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK) High Schools Research Projects Competition on a social science subject to learn the research process and its methods.

Students are encouraged to take part in robotics studies in 9th, 10th, and 11th grades to complement the theoretical courses offered to them; they team up to enter national and international robotics competitions, such as FLL, and mainly FRC. They also receive courses on Radio Controlled Aircraft in which students design, manufacture, program, and fly model airplanes to put the things they have been taught into practice. Students follow a highly-specialized curriculum with a scientific focus and continue improving themselves on scientific and technological concepts at clubs and societies that take up approximately 10 hours per week of their free time. Approximately 40% of the class then continues with these applications in their sophomore year and go on to participate at international competitions.

All juniors and seniors attend in-house Turkish University Preparatory Classes, during the week, as well as on weekends. BHSSciTech students succeed in obtaining top-level results at the nationally administered Turkish University Entrance exams, and according to statistics provided by Government’s Measuring, Selection and Placement Center (ÖSYM), BHSSciTech is the top scoring school in the Turkish University Entrance exams in the science and mathematics category.