Meet Tugba Bozcaga, 2019 First Generation Scholar in the Profession

Tugba Bozcaga is a PhD Candidate in the department of political science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her research interests lie in comparative political economy, with a substantive focus on development, governance, and distributive politics. Her dissertation examines how local social ties and institutions affect state capacity and service provision in Turkey. She is a Junior Fellow at the Association for Analytic Learning about Islam and Muslim Societies (AALIMS) and a Graduate Student Affiliate at Harvard University Center for European Studies. In 2019, Tugba organized a kickoff event at MIT with the goal to introduce a first-generation network for students in MIT’s graduate programs and hopes to continue similar initiatives in the future.

About the APSA First Generation Scholar in the Profession Travel Reimbursement Grant
In 2015, the APSA Executive Council approved a new standing Committee on First Generation Higher Education Scholars in the Profession, parallel to the existing APSA status committees.  The goal is to bring focused attention to the ways in which class, economic inequality, and mobility can affect political scientists’ ability to thrive educationally and professionally, perhaps throughout their careers. The APSA Committee on the Status of First Generation Scholars matched contributions that were made to the APSA Annual Fund during one week in September 2019 to support the professional development support of first gen scholars in the profession.  Learn more.