Lessons from a ten-year-long journey: building a student-driven computational biology society across Turkey [version 1; peer review: not peer reviewed]

• Published in: F1000 research Vol. 11; p. 98
• Main Authors: Kaya, Yasin, Karakulak, Tülay, Can Saylan, Cemil, Gür, E. Ravza, Tatlıdil, Engin, Güleşen, Sevilay, Betül Dinçaslan, Fatma, Dönertaş, Handan Melike
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England Faculty of 1000 Ltd 2022; F1000 Research Limited
• Subjects: Bioinformatics; Biology; Careers; Collaboration; Communication; Computational Biology - education; Computer applications; Humans; Learned societies; Open access; Research Personnel; Researchers; Social networks; Society; Students; Trends; Turkey; Values; Web sites; Turkey; iscb; student council; 10 years; turkey
• ISSN: 2046-1402; 2046-1402
• DOI: 10.12688/f1000research.107886.1

The Regional Student Group Turkey (RSG-Turkey) is officially associated with the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB) Student Council (SC). At the RSG-Turkey, we aim to contribute to the early-career researchers in computational biology and bioinformatics fields by providing opportunities for improving their academic and technical skills in the field. Over the last ten years, we have built a well-known student-driven academic society in Turkey that organizes numerous events every year and continues to grow with over 650 current members. Celebrating the 10th anniversary of RSG-Turkey, in this communication, we share our experiences, five main lessons we learned, and the steps to establish a long-standing academic community: having a clear mission, building a robust structure, effective communication, turning challenges into opportunities, and building collaborations. We believe that our experiences can help students and academics establish long-standing communities in fast-developing areas like bioinformatics.