INTERNATIONALIZATION OF UNIVERSITIES IN KAZAKHSTAN: A STEP TOWARDS INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION STANDARDS
In his Message to the People of Kazakhstan dated September 2, 2024, the Head of State noted: "The government is internationalizing higher education – 23 well-known foreign universities have been attracted to the country. It is necessary to provide every possible assistance to their activities, including through a phased expansion of the state order for the training of specialists."
Partnership agreements have been concluded with 34 foreign universities. Currently, there are 23 partner universities in the UK, Italy, China, Russia, the USA, France and South Korea.
There are 11 more agreements to be implemented in 2025.
The government has allocated 2,090 grants for Kazakhstani students to study at partner universities abroad.
Today, thousands of students are receiving education in 34 specialties, including such key areas as pedagogical, engineering, and artificial intelligence.
For these purposes, state educational grants (joint educational programs and dual degree programs) and funds from investors are allocated with the support of the state in providing conditions for them.
The selection of foreign partner universities is based on the staffing needs in individual industries and the demands of the regions.
Cooperation with leading foreign universities is focused on training specialists in particularly sought-after and scarce specialties, such as the nuclear industry, the development of "green" hydrogen, and ensuring water safety, which have no analogues in Kazakhstan.
As part of the execution of the instruction of the Head of State, a branch of the British university University Heriot Watt was opened on the basis of Aktobe Regional University named after K.Zhubanov on the programs petroleum engineering, electric power engineering, computer engineering.
A branch of the D.I.Mendeleev Russian University of Chemical Technology has been opened on the basis of the M.Dulati Taraz Regional University for training personnel in the field of chemistry and chemical technology.
There is a branch of Gazi University (Turkey) on the basis of the South Kazakhstan Pedagogical University for the training of teaching staff.
The branch of the Beijing University of Languages and Culture (PRC) operates on the basis of Astana International University.
A branch of Queens University (Ireland) on the basis of Narhoz University.
As part of the strategy for the internationalization of higher education until 2025, a scholarship program has been launched for foreign citizens, including those from the Kazakh diaspora who are not citizens of the Republic of Kazakhstan.
In the 2024-2025 academic year, 550 students were accepted at 37 universities in Kazakhstan under the scholarship program for foreign citizens (bachelor's degree - 490, master's degree - 50, doctoral degree - 10). The scholarship program includes free education and a monthly stipend.
Development of educational tourism in Kazakhstan
The Bolashak International Scholarship has been operating for 30 years. On behalf of the Head of State, the Bolashak International Scholarship has been reoriented towards technical, engineering, medical and pedagogical areas.
Over the years of its existence, the scholarship has allowed more than 12,727 Kazakhstanis to study at leading universities in the world, 55% of them studied humanities, 36% engineering, 7% medical, 2% culture and art.
Graduates have studied and completed internships at more than 400 leading foreign universities in more than 30 countries around the world.
In 2024, graduates of the program performed 213,000 medical operations, trained 145 thousand students, and published more than a thousand scientific papers.
In 2024, the share of foreign students in the university population was 15%, 245 dual degree programs were implemented with 97 universities from 23 countries.
The number of international students was 31,400 from 93 countries, which is 4,600 more than in 2023, 26,800 students from 82 countries.
More than 1,600 foreign experts are involved in teaching at universities in Kazakhstan.
As a result of the educational programs in 2024, 21 Kazakhstani universities were included in the international ranking of the best universities in the world QS World University Rankings 2024.
"It is necessary to significantly update the content and methods of teaching university subjects. Future teachers, doctors, agronomists, lawyers, and industry specialists must necessarily have basic knowledge in the field of artificial intelligence," Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said.
In order to implement the instructions of the Head of State, scientific organizations and universities of the country are provided with free access to international databases.
Together with Google, Artificial intelligence courses have been launched for 5,000 students from 15 universities in the country.
Within the framework of the Coursera online educational platform project, 40 thousand licenses were allocated to Kazakhstani students and 153 thousand certificates were issued from 93 universities.
Agreements have been reached with leading universities in Korea and China on knowledge transfer and joint training of specialists.
On behalf of the Head of State, artificial intelligence schools are operating on the basis of three Kazakhstani universities.:
At the Kyzylorda University named after Korkyt Ata School of Artificial Intelligence of Seoul National University of Science and Technology has been opened.
A branch of the City University of Hong Kong has been established at the K.I.Satpayev Kazakh National Research Technical University.
An International AI Research Center and a center for Smart transport management technologies have been opened at D.Serikbayev East Kazakhstan Technical University on the basis of the Lu Ban Workshop.
Relevant courses from international technology giants Google, NVIDIA, Huawei, Coursera, etc. have been introduced in domestic universities.
Memoranda have been signed with Coursera, Google, Nvidia, Huawei Technologies Kazakhstan LLP, 01 Edu System, Binance Kazakhstan.
On the basis of the AstanaHub Technopark, full-scale courses for university teachers in AI have been launched, covering 700 teachers from 47 universities in Kazakhstan.
The Interuniversity AI Standard has been adopted in the field of artificial intelligence (AI), 20 universities have developed 20 new educational programs on AI.
The training of the KazLLM language model based on 148 billion tokens in Kazakh, English, and Russian has been completed.
The model was developed with the participation of the Nazarbayev University team, al-Farabi Kazakh National University, the National Scientific and Practical Center "Til-Kazyna" named after Shaysultan Shayakhmetov and others.
117 experts were involved in the development, including more than 40 candidates of sciences, PhD and masters of research institutes and universities.
The Ministry presented to the Head of State the pilot AI program AI-Sana, aimed at the comprehensive development of AI skills among students of all levels in priority specialties, covering 100,000 students who will study artificial intelligence, programming and startup acceleration.

Source : https://www.gov.kz/memleket/entities/sci/press/news/details/919551