Description: Recently, the world has witnessed a heated political traffic to and from 'Cyprus', increasing bi-communal efforts to spread mutual understanding between two Cypriot communities, and mass demonstrations in the North to pressure negotiators to reach a workable solution on the island. In the heat of these events, many educational issues have passed unremarked and unchallenged. This is especially true for Turkish Cypriot education which is virtually invisible in scholarly literature and about which knowledge is very limited. This paper aims to shed light on Turkish Cypriot education and to draw attention to the educational reform movements in the North which began in 2004. It situates the reform initiation stage within a broad socio-political framework, explores the motives behind the reforms, and investigates the critical challenges policy makers need to address to make the reform vision a reality. Methodology: Qualitative interviews and field notes were used to collect data from: five educational planners who played a major, critical role in the initiation stage of the reform initiatives, three school directors and six teachers teaching in schools affected by demographic changes and migration from Turkey. Informal conversations were also conducted with economists and politicians. Interviews conducted with policy makers were guided by pre-formulated themes focusing on the reasons or reform, planned reform initiatives, and challenges faced during initial stages; the ones conducted with principals and teachers zoomed in on demographic issues and their impact on the quality of education. Data gathered were coded and analyzed to elicit the recurring themes and concepts. Conclusions: The policy makers' vision for Turkish Cypriot education system is in line with worldwide educational reform efforts which aim to create skilful knowledge workers able to contribute and benefit from the 'knowledge society'. However, an equally important feature of their agenda is to promote tolerance and understanding, and to educate citizens to be more aware of and sensitive to issues in North Cyprus and beyond. This agenda is not only congruent with socio-political developments on the island but also aims to tackle the challenges created by them. The paper concludes that to make this vision a reality, policy changes must address the sustainability of reform. This is particularly challenging because: (1) some have used state authority to meet personal aspirations and (2) an ambiguous recruitment policy and the waste of effective human resources have produced a half-paralyzed public sector. It is also essential to address challenges created and maintained by demographic movements to and from Turkey and to build a system that better tackles these challenges. Finally, the paper argues that differing conceptions of national identity must be addressed and that this is unavoidable.