On July 3, 2026, the Department of Computer Engineering hosted Dr. Mercan Topkara, a Bilkent CS alumna and founder of Hashtag In Real Life, for a seminar and faculty working session titled “What to Keep, What to Change: Preparing CS Graduates for the Era of Agentic Coding.”
During the two-hour session, Dr. Topkara discussed how agentic coding tools are transforming professional software development. The discussion highlighted the shift from writing and debugging code line by line toward defining intent, coordinating AI agents across multiple repositories, and working with agents to design, verify, deploy, and maintain software systems.
Drawing on current industry practices and hiring expectations, Dr. Topkara and Bilkent CS faculty examined the implications of this transformation for undergraduate computer science education. The participants discussed which computer science fundamentals will remain essential, which skills are becoming increasingly important, and how existing courses may need to evolve to prepare graduates for AI-augmented software engineering workflows.
Dr. Topkara received her B.S. degree from Bilkent University’s Department of Computer Engineering in 2000. Her career spans natural language processing, content protection, and large-scale AI and machine learning systems, including research and leadership positions at IBM Research, JW Player, Teachers Pay Teachers, Luminary, and Sounder. She has authored more than 30 peer-reviewed publications and holds 10 patents.