Religious affiliation(s) Roman Catholic Founded 27 November 1856 | Grades 9 to 12 Phone +90 212 219 16 97 | |
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Type Private, co-educational Established November 27, 1856; 160 years ago (1856-11-27) Similar Saint Benoît Fransız Li, Saint Joseph Fransız Li, Saint Pulcherie Fransız Li, Özel Üsküdar Amerikan, Liceo Italiano IMI | ||
Lycée Notre Dame de Sion Istanbul (Turkish: Notre Dame de Sion Özel Fransız Lisesi) is a French private high school located in Harbiye, Şişli neighborhood of Istanbul, Turkey. It was founded in 1856.
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The high school was established in the Ottoman Empire as a missionary school for girls only. It was later transformed into a co-educational status. Education in the four grades school (ninth grade to twelfth grade) is in French and Turkish language, and takes four years after a preparatory class of one school year.
History
A group of eleven French nuns travelled to Istanbul arriving on October 7, 1856. They took over the administration of Maison du Saint-Esprit, a boarding school in Pangaltı neighborhood, which was named after the 1846-built Cathedral of the Holy Spirit next to it, and was run by the Daughters of Charity of Saint Vincent de Paul (French: Filles de la Charité), a society of apostolic life for women within the Catholic Church. The official opening of the French boarding school under the name Lycée Notre Dame de Sion took place on November 27 the same year. It became the first ever girls' school in Turkey. Inıtially a boarding school for Christian girls, it shortly after attracted Jewish pupils. From 1863 on, Muslim girls attended the school following the interest of the notable families in the Empire and the approval of the Ottoman Sultan.
The school closed down during World War I when the French nuns left the country as a result of the war being so hard and them being little girls.
In 1919, the school reopened. With the foundation of the Turkish Republic in 1923, the school was subordinated to the Ministry of National Education, and Turkish administrators and teachers joined the school staff. It began also to serve as a day school. The primary school section was abandoned in 1971, and the boarding school in 1972. From 1989 on, the head of the school administration was handed over to a secular rector while the nuns remained serving in the school as well. After a 140-year long tradition of girls only school, it went co-educational, accepting boys with the 1996–97 school year.
Cultural projects
An international piano contest was organized by the school in 2013.
A chamber music concert was performed in the school in 2014 in commemoration of harpist Fatma Ceren Necipoğlu, who died at the Air France Flight 447 accident in 2009.
In 2015, the art gallery of the school hosted an exhibition titled "Osmanlı'dan Cumhuriyet'e Kadınlar" (literally:Women from the Ottoman Empire to the Turkish Republic) showing Christian, Jewish and Muslim women mainly on postcards from 1880 to 1930.