My new article, Surviving a Crisis: Transformation, Adaptation, and Resistance in Higher Education, is now out. The article is open access and the online first version is available to download at https://dergipark.org.tr/en/pub/hegp/issue/69503/1054946. This is the first article to be published from my PhD research and it also builds on the webinar I gave at the …
Next Generation: Reflections and perspectives on higher education in the former Soviet Union [free online conference, 14 & 15 Feb]
The conference image. Source: Pixabay I warmly invite you to join a free online conference I am organizing at UNESCO together with HSE University (Russia) on 14 and 15 February. All welcome with registration required (links below). Please share the information widely. Date: Monday 14 February 2022 and Tuesday 15 February 2022 Time: 09:00 – …
Kazakhstan: Higher education on hold at home, students stranded abroad
Protests in Kazakhstan have put higher education in the country on hold and the start of term postponed, while many students remain stranded abroad. My Kazakhstan-based colleague Dana Abdrasheva and I wrote about the latest situation and the implications for higher education for University World News. Here's a reprint of the article that was published on …
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Kazakhstan, Russia, and the international students caught in between
Kazakhstan is in the world's headlines after a series of protests that started over energy price hikes rapidly escalated and continue to unfold at the time of writing this on 7 January 2022. The involvement of Russia into the situation in Kazakhstan just a couple of days into events has set off alarm bells and …
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Starting from the top: Steps towards autonomy in Uzbekistan’s universities
One last reform to Uzbekistan's higher education system rounds out another busy year of change in that country. New rules are coming in that will allow certain universities greater autonomy over who they choose to lead them and will also create a new supervisory board structure similar to a governing body. From plans to create …
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Politics with pedigree: Tracing the long history of political science in Uzbekistan
With a lineage that goes back well over a thousand years, it might seem surprising that political science in Uzbekistan is considered a relatively new subject for teaching and research. Why yes, we can talk politics in Uzbekistan (as of 2019) As pointed in an excellent review of the development of political science recently published …
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From Afghanistan to Kyrgyzstan: Supporting higher education across borders
From journalist Bermet Talant at EurasiaNet comes an uplifting story showcasing higher education as it could be: rising above the day-to-day to support students, setting aside financial concerns and overcoming national boundaries. Read the report below. Talant recounts how 180 students made their way out of the precarious conditions in Afghanistan following the country's takeover …
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The next ten years in Central Asian higher education: Looking to the future after a decade of blogging
I've spent many a happy hour enjoying the challenge of finding a vaguely suitable cat meme to go with many of my blog posts Somehow, the tenth anniversary of this blog has rolled around. From my very first post published on 30 September 2011, I've published 345 posts, averaging around three posts a month. In …
International students can return to Russia
International students are ready to fly back to Russia - if they can afford the price of the ticket After partially reopening its borders to international students in March 2021, the Russian government announced in September that all international students can return - or come for the first time - to study in the country. …
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Knowledge production in post-Soviet Central Asia / Производство знаний в постсоветкстой Центральной Азии
Here's a very nice (Russian language) summary of a recent (English language) seminar given by Professor Sarfaroz Niyozov of the University of Toronto, Canada on knowledge production in Tajikistan. Niyozov draws on global discourses of decolonization, recolonization and indigenization as they might pertain to the contemporary Central Asian context. You can also watch the seminar …
Emma Sabzalieva 