Comparative and International Higher Education Policy Specialist; Focus on Central Asia
A swathe of regulations, rankings, mergers, acquistions, and threats of closure for poor quality universities typify the Kazakh government's drive in recent years to increase and assure quality in its higher education system. The latest target of the quality movement is Innovation University, which had its operating licence removed in late January 2020 after two …
Continue reading Going, going, gone: Kazakhstan’s Innovation University is shut down
In yet another move to distance itself from its communist past, the Kazakh Minister for Education and Science Yerlan Sagadiyev recently announced [ru] that the era of state-issued diplomas (degree certificates) would soon be coming to an end. Announced in parliament when everyone else was distracted (bored to tears?) by the recent Kazakhstani national elections, the announcement means that from …
The Kazakh Minister of Education and Science Dr Aslan Sarinzhipov has this week laid out the steps identified by the national government to improving human capital and therefore economic prosperity in 21st century Kazakhstan. In May 2015, the government identified five areas of institutional reform, which collectively have 100 steps that must be achieved before completion of the National Plan. …
Continue reading The Kazakh National Plan: 100 steps to success
Although this blog focusses on Central Asia, every now and then something happens in the broader sphere of influence on Central Asia that merits being featured. As part of its drive to enhancing the quality of university education in Russia, University World News this week reports on news that the federal government has recently decided that fully 40% of all …
Continue reading University closures in Russia – will Central Asia follow?
In this round up of education news from Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan at the start of 2015, a number of paradoxes emerge, none of which lend themselves to quick or easy solutions. Here are the four issues that I think will be on the agenda for education in the region this year: 1. Reform needed, but at whose cost? …
Continue reading School education in Central Asia – the four challenges for 2015
I had no idea that this story would keep running and running... but now Eurasia Net have got in on the act and published their own story about the higher education system in Tajikistan. Entitled 'Tajikistan: Even the Government Won't Hire College Graduates', Asel Kalybekova's story focusses on two quality issues: 1. The perceived lack …
Like a growing number of countries worldwide, Kyrgyzstan offers standardised testing to determine entry into higher education. The tests, commonly called by their abbreviation ОРТ (Общереспубликанское тестирование or ORT, Republic-wide Testing) were introduced in in 2002, a first for Central Asian countries. Another stand-out fact is that the ORT is run by a non-governmental organisation, the Centre …
Continue reading Test time for Kyrgyz secondary school students
Emma Sabzalieva 