The Balkan Universities Association Museum is on Trakya University's Karaağaç campus in Edirne, in the restored historic building known as the Çifte Çınarlı Köşk — the twin plane trees mansion. It opened together with the Council of Higher Education's Balkan and Regional Representation office in the same building.
The subject is the association itself. Trakya University founded the Balkan Universities Association in 2014 and serves as its permanent general secretariat; the rector states that it had reached 92 members by the time the museum opened. The university also describes itself as the Turkish higher education institution with the most museums.
The opening, reported by the university in May 2024, had a strongly Balkan guest list: rectors and former rectors from Shumen University and Sofia University in Bulgaria, Tuzla University, the University of Tetova and the Canadian Institute of Technology were there alongside the governor of Edirne. The governor described Edirne as a base for the country's work towards the Balkans, which is why a regional office of the Council of Higher Education made sense here. After the ribbon was cut the guests toured the museum and the Balkan Universities Association memorial forest beside it.
When to go
- Climate
- Across Edirne as a whole, monthly mean temperatures run from 2.8 °C in January to 24.8 °C in July; the mean stays between 15 and 25 °C in May, June, July, August and September; rainfall is heaviest in December (71 mm) and lightest in August (23 mm). Long-term means for 1930-2025 from the Turkish State Meteorological Service (MGM).
