Türkiye’s Ministry of National Education has announced a 35 percent increase in education support for certain students attending private schools in areas affected by the February 6 earthquakes during the 2026-2027 academic year. The measure took effect through a communiqué prepared jointly by the Ministry of National Education and the Ministry of Treasury and Finance and published in the Official Gazette.
Which areas and students are covered?
The geographical scope includes the provinces of Adıyaman, Hatay, Kahramanmaraş and Malatya, as well as the İslahiye and Nurdağı districts of Gaziantep. This distinction matters: the measure does not cover every district in Gaziantep. According to the official announcement, the payment applies to students who had already been included in the education support programme and who have not yet completed the school stage they are attending. It should therefore not be interpreted as an automatic payment to every private-school student in the affected region.
The ministry said the amounts set for the 2025-2026 academic year were increased by 35 percent for 2026-2027. The new amount is 44,906 Turkish lira for each student in the fourth grade of a private primary school. Students in the eighth grade of private middle schools and the twelfth grade of private high schools will each receive 52,488 lira in support.
What do the new amounts mean?
The published figures show that the level of support differs by school stage. The amount for fourth-grade primary students was calculated separately from the amount for eighth-grade middle-school and twelfth-grade high-school students. The announced percentage increase is measured against the support levels in the previous academic year. The communiqué updates the programme for continuing beneficiaries as they move through the 2026-2027 school year.
The wider purpose of the measure is to support educational continuity in communities affected by the earthquakes. Whether a student has completed the relevant school stage is one of the defining eligibility conditions. Families and schools should follow the ministry’s official announcements and guidance from the relevant administrative units for implementation details. The communiqué establishes the amounts and broad eligibility framework; it does not justify assumptions about application deadlines or payment dates that were not included in the cited announcements.
Official and independent reporting align
The Ministry of National Education’s announcement dated October 6, 2026 provides the detailed geographical scope and the per-student amounts. Anadolu Agency and TRT Haber reported the measure on the same day, independently confirming the 35 percent increase, the covered provinces and districts, and the grade-based figures. The core numbers and the description of eligible students are consistent across all three sources.
The most important qualification concerns the shorthand reference to “five provinces.” Adıyaman, Hatay, Kahramanmaraş and Malatya are included province-wide, while only İslahiye and Nurdağı are covered in Gaziantep. The programme also targets students who were already receiving support and have not completed their school stage, rather than all newly enrolled private-school students. The updated amounts confirm that the programme will continue for this defined beneficiary group during the 2026-2027 academic year.
The programme’s focus on fourth, eighth and twelfth grades links the support to the final year of each school stage. Even so, attendance in one of those grades is not sufficient on its own: the student must also meet the continuing-beneficiary condition described by the ministry.
