Turkey’s Youth-Led Uprising: From University Campuses to High School Classrooms

Istanbul’s political scene was upended on March 19 when Ekrem İmamoğlu, Istanbul’s Mayor and presidential hopeful from the main opposition CHP, was detained and arrested under corruption and terrorism charges widely denounced as fabricated. The move ignited mass protests across Turkey—led predominantly by university students—calling not just for İmamoğlu’s release but for democratic reforms, justice, and an end to President Erdoğan’s decades-long rule.

The movement began with a viral video of students tearing down police barricades at Istanbul University and quickly grew into a nationwide uprising. Their slogans, posters, and chants—one of the most viral reading “Recep, I want to break up”—have become symbols of generational frustration and a longing for change.

Lawyers defending students detained during protests—301 of the nearly 2,000 total detainees—highlighted that their only “offense” was engaging in peaceful, constitutionally protected protest. “They committed no crime,” one lawyer told The Guardian. “All they did was protest.”

Despite the police violence and being held through religious holidays, the students remain defiant. Berkay Gezgin, 21, who coined the phrase “Everything will be beautiful” during İmamoğlu’s 2019 campaign, was among those released. “We’ll get Ekrem out too,” he said after his release on April 10. “No one can suppress the will of the people.”

Teachers Targeted, High Schoolers Rise

The student-led resistance intensified on April 8 after the Ministry of Education reassigned thousands of teachers, many from elite “project schools.” Students, alumni, and parents responded with sit-ins and a viral campaign, #öğretmenimedokunma (“Don’t Touch My Teacher”), accusing the government of purging oppositional voices from education.

According to Eğitim-Sen President Kemal Irmak, some 20,000 teachers were reassigned and 5,000 dismissed, often replaced without transparency or merit. “This isn’t just about staff rotation—it’s ideological cleansing,” Irmak told Fayn Press.

The Ministry denied political motives, but on April 14—marking the anniversary of the first student mass mobilization post-1980 coup—high school and university students gathered in Beşiktaş Square. One student’s speech captured the moment: “They removed our teachers because they stood with us. We are here to stand by them.”

Opposition parties are now backing nationwide boycotts and protests as youth resistance morphs into a broader civil movement.