Struggles of management engineering education in turkey

The Istanbul Technical University (ITU) has always provided a positive environment for the creation of new engineering fields. Despite this favorable atmosphere, the emergence and development of management engineering was not easily accepted by all. Beginning with ITU´s establishment, this article summarizes the history of the program, its curricular developments to address changing societal conditions and the demands of the labor market, and new challenges presented by integration into European higher education. This article concludes with an analysis of the continuous quality improvement process undertaken by ITU´s Department of Management Engineering, which brought the realization that a curricular update served not only ABET substantial equivalency but also as preparation for the Bologna process in which Turkey participates