I have a new book review out. Sometimes, a book comes along just at the right time. The recent publication of 25 Years of Transformations of Higher Education Systems in Post-Soviet Countries: Reform and Continuity was that book in 2018 for me. The book is the main end product of an exhaustive and huge-scale project led …
Tag: post-Soviet
Kazakhstan distances itself from Soviet past
Here's a beautiful photo reportage on the gradual disappearance of large-scale Soviet-era frescos and mosaics that used to be commonplace on the walls of buildings all over the Soviet Union. Entitled 'The walls are crying', the article recognises that the façades of public buildings were very consciously used in Soviet times as a way of …
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University of Central Asia public lecture on education and identity among Pamiri youth – 22 August, Bishkek
This lecture looks really interesting. I can't attend (being in Oxford, not Bishkek at the moment!) but if any readers go, I'd love to hear your comments. Here is the info from University of Central Asia's website: http://www.ucentralasia.org/news.asp?Nid=384 Education, Identity and Resilience among Gorno-Badakhshan Pamiri Youth by Carole Faucher Speaker: Carole Faucher Date: 22 August …
Modern day Kazakhs: young, uncertain and ‘lazy’?
Tengri News today reports on a study in which a group of experts have tried to come up with an illustration of the modern day Kazakh. The group make some interesting assertions, focussing on young people in their depictions. Here's the article reposted in full: Psychologists, economists and financial experts have attempted to create a …
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Interesting times for Ukrainian higher education
Whilst this blog has a key focus on higher education in Central Asia, it occasionally visits other post-Soviet countries to catch up with developments there. Today we're in Ukraine, at the western edge of the former Union. Whilst Central Asian countries and Ukraine share a Soviet heritage, there are also some notable differences. For example, …
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Post-soviet universities need academic salaries reform to succeed – University World News
Re-post of an interesting article from: http://www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?story=201204070940315 By Gregory Androushchak and Maria Yudkevich For decades, universities in Soviet countries were governed, evaluated and financed according to the same principles. The system is not like this any more. However, faculty contracts – a core element in any university – have not changed much. Faculty contracts in post-Soviet …
Post-Soviet education, part 2: Uzbekistan
Here are a couple of stories about cotton-rich Uzbekistan. The first, from a blog called Why Nations Fail, looks at the phenomenon of children being forced to pick cotton when they should be in school. Below is an extract from the blog post specific to Uzbekistan: ... For starters, take Uzbekistan. Why does it have …
Post-Soviet education, part 1: Russia
By happy coincidence, I've read a number of articles recently looking at education in a number of the post-Soviet countries. Below is an interesting story about Russia, written just before Putin's re-"election" as President, and it also touches on higher education. The story is (c) Ria Novosti. Putin praises Russia's educational revolution An “educational revolution” …
20 years on: human rights in the post-Soviet countries
I'd like to recommend a great article I've just read, The Soviet Fall and the Arab Spring. By an experienced human rights researcher, the article provides six ideas "about what has to happen after the revolution to make change stick". The six ideas are: 1. There is nothing inevitable about transitions to democracy 2. Guard …
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Emma Sabzalieva 