From Social Responsibility to Social Distance: Northern Cyprus Universities in the Pandemic

Universities are seen as key drivers of social change and development in their local surroundings as well as the society itself. The social responsibility of the universities is regarded as their third mission after research and instruction duties all over the world. This third mission is accomplished through a variety of actions and disse mination of information through official websites as online disclosure is one way to accomplish corporate communication This research has the purpose to examine the news, activities and announcement links to the websites of 24 universities in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus regarding their corporate commu nication issues in terms universities social respon sibilities during the first year of the pandemic. A qualitative document analysis was conducted to gather data from the universities’ websites and content analysis was applied to the data obtained. Codes are generated under categories in three themes. Findings revealed that universities use three different links for a variety of information disseminated through the websites inter changeably. News links are generally used for various notifications and information about covid effects mostly. Institutional contacts, official meetings and gatherings, and Covid based educational issues, con ferences and seminars were posted through the activity links of the universities. Announcement links were generally used to inform students about the semester issues and distance education information were posted by the universities.