Turkey's ambitious campaign to reduce poverty includes convincing reluctant parents to send their daughters to school.
At the crossroads of Asia and Europe, Turkey is a country with a large, young population. But literacy rates have traditionally lagged behind neighboring Greece and Bulgaria. With its sights firmly set on future EU membership, Turkey has identified education as key to reducing poverty. So Turkey has embarked on an ambitious campaign, targeting those most deprived of education-young teenage girls-especially from the poor rural areas. Life visits Turkey's eastern Province of Van and meets 13-year-old Yaprak, just one of the many targeted by this massive education drive. She, for one, is sure of the benefits. "I want to study until the end. I want to finish university. I want to have a job."
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