Baykar Board Chairman Selçuk Bayraktar announced that a school for unmanned aerial vehicles bearing the name of his late father, Özdemir Bayraktar, will be established in Gökçeada. In a post on his X account on the evening of Nov. 6, Bayraktar said, "One of my late father Özdemir Bayraktar's greatest wishes was for a school to be established in Gökçeada… With the excitement of fulfilling his bequest, we are establishing the Gökçeada Özdemir Bayraktar Vocational School of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles through cooperation among our Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University, Baykar and our T3 Foundation. May it benefit our young people and our nation."
The announcement was first made on Nov. 5 at the 2026-2027 Academic Year Opening and Honorary Doctorate Conferment Ceremony held at the İÇDAŞ Kara Yusuf Congress Center of Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University (ÇOMÜ). Anadolu Agency reported that Bayraktar said, "The school will be based in Gökçeada, as my late father also wished."
The video shared by Bayraktar includes excerpts from his speech in a hall filled with students and academics. Expressing his happiness at being in Çanakkale, Bayraktar says that Kızılelma, Akıncı and Bayraktar TB2 continue their flights in this region and that their work carries the traces of the spirit of Çanakkale. Addressing young people, Bayraktar says, "In our youth, we could draw inspiration almost exclusively from the works of foreigners," before announcing the new school. The video ends with footage from the honorary doctorate ceremony.
Training in Gökçeada, Keşan and at the Baykar campus
According to Bayraktar’s announcement, students will receive training in Gökçeada as well as at Baykar’s Flight Training and Testing Center in Keşan, Edirne, and will use Baykar’s campus. The school will provide education in industry, aviation, unmanned systems and autonomous technologies. Bayraktar said, "While working on today’s technologies in one sense, we will also work on the unmanned systems of the future and provide hands-on training. I believe this is highly valuable in an era marked by artificial intelligence."
In his speech at the ceremony, ÇOMÜ Rector Prof. Dr. Ramazan Cüneyt Erenoğlu also said they aimed to develop joint education models and research projects with Baykar in unmanned aerial vehicles, autonomous systems, artificial intelligence, software, electronics and materials technologies. The announcements did not include details on when the school would begin offering education or which programs would open.
At the talk titled "A Meeting with Young People on the Horizon: The National Technology Initiative," Bayraktar said Baykar operates in more than 40 countries and has facilities in seven countries. He also said that the sixth satellite had been launched as part of the Uluğ Bey Global Positioning and Communications System, which was established with revenue from UAV exports.
In memory of Özdemir Bayraktar
Özdemir Bayraktar, who played a major role in the founding of Baykar and served as the company’s board chairman until his death, was known as the designer of the Bayraktar TB2 and Bayraktar Akıncı. Known as a pioneer of Türkiye’s armed unmanned aerial vehicles, Bayraktar died at the age of 72 on Oct. 18, 2021. At the ceremony, Selçuk Bayraktar presented Çanakkale Governor Ömer Toraman and Rector Erenoğlu with a model of Kızılelma and a book about his father’s life.
Gökçeada, which is part of Çanakkale, is Türkiye’s largest island. Located in the northeastern Aegean Sea at the entrance to the Gulf of Saros, the island currently hosts ÇOMÜ’s Gökçeada Vocational School and Gökçeada School of Applied Sciences.
At the ceremony, ÇOMÜ’s Senate conferred an honorary doctorate on Selçuk Bayraktar through a decision dated Nov. 3, 2026. The university also presented Bayraktar with a historic artillery officer’s sword used on the Çanakkale Front during World War I, bearing the inscription "Allah Is with Us."
Video: Selçuk Bayraktar / X. Photo: Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University
