In this study, the current rectors of 197 universities (127 public and 70 non-profit foundation universities) in Turkey were examined in terms of their sociodemographic characteristics, career development, and academic qualifications (the number of published articles and citations and H-index). The data were collected via a prosopograhical approach from the official websites of the universities and the presidents, as well as the Web of Science and Scopus databases. The findings suggest that the presidents may be classified into two groups based on their sociodemographic characteristics, career development, and academic qualifications. In the first group are those rectors who are dominantly male, are graduates of Turkish universities, and have lower academic qualifications in terms of the number of published articles, citations of their published works, and their H-index. The social media posts of the members of this group show intense loyalty and support to Turkey's governing ideology, and the academic performance of the universities managed by these rectors is poor. The second group of rectors is also male-dominant and is comprised of graduates of foreign universities. These individuals generally have backgrounds in engineering, medicine or administrative science, and higher academic qualifications in terms of the number of published articles, citations of their published works and their H-index. Their social media posts often include news related to students and their academic and scientific achievements. The academic performance of the universities managed by these rectors was also found to be high.