Kazakhstan’s Nazarbayev University — a Bet on the Future in Central Asia
Kazakhstan is still considered by some to be a developing country, but you wouldn’t know it from the capital city. I was surprised to find ultra-modern buildings, sports arenas, and monuments — some by famous architects. And the building spree isn’t finished; cranes are everywhere. The lavish attention and rapid expansion followed the city being named Kazakhstan’s new capital only 20 years ago, an act of president Nursultan Nazarbayev. Long known as Astana, this past spring the city was renamed Nur-Sultan, in honor of the president stepping down after a whopping 29 years.
I didn’t get a chance to visit other parts of Kazakhstan, but there’s certainly significant inequity. Rural poverty isn’t surprising, but even among cities, Astana/Nur-Sultan is presently getting all the attention and all the money. I did spot some imperfections under the surface: newly-built stone walkways lacked drainage and had already collapsed in places, and construction of an elevated metro was put on indefinite hold when the allocated funds were “misplaced” (translation: corruption); large unused cement support pillars lining many of the major roads are a constant reminder of that failure.
My visit was hosted by Nazarbayev University, which in some ways is a smaller-scale reflection of the city: It was launched by the president, named after him, and has been allocated ample resources. (The university currently consumes a whopping 20% of the country’s entire education budget, down from an even higher fraction during construction.) Less than ten years old, NU is already easily the premier university in the country, attracting an international faculty and housed in extensive brand-new airy facilities. On the other hand, the faculty describe mountains of bureaucracy. For example, if a student needs to miss a class, he or she is required to submit a paper form signed by the department chair and the school dean. (Imagine if that were the case at Stanford — even with 24/7 signing I wouldn’t be able to keep up!) The coffee breaks during my teaching featured a variety of snacks … which required provost-level approval. Bureaucracy aside, based on the faculty I met and the participants in the Big Data short-course, Design Thinking workshop, and women’s roundtable, I’m optimistic about NU’s future.
At the risk of overdoing a theme, my teaching venue followed a similar pattern to the city and the university. The 3.5 day Big Data short-course was scheduled in the university’s most majestic auditorium, with a giant podium, ornate high ceilings, and wraparound tiered seating for 200. I was duly impressed, but it turns out it’s only used these days when the president comes for a visit: the podium is miles from the seats, the acoustics are terrible, the microphone is finicky, and the projector is dim. Once we had a solid head-count (about 80 participants, nearly all of whom stuck it out to the end) the organizers put in a heroic effort to relocate a number of classes — imagine the paperwork that must have required — allowing us to move to a much more hospitable room.
The Big Data participants — undergraduate and graduate students plus a few faculty — struck a nice middle ground between some past participants who were either too advanced for the material or ultra-competitive with each other, and others who were not ready for the level or intensity of work. In Kazakhstan the participants were eager, prepared, diligent, and wanted to make the most of the time we had together. Many of them had a strong interest in data science as a field — I’ve noticed a considerable uptick in student awareness of data science as a career option just in the few years I’ve been travel-teaching.
My final day was a workshop on Design Thinking & Collaborative Problem-Solving, followed by a dinner roundtable with about 25 women students and faculty. Design Thinking workshops are team-based and, as the title suggests, collaborative. Although instructions and general discussion are in English, teams often communicate amongst themselves in their native language. Here I encouraged team discussion in Russian, the “lingua franca” of central Asia. (Many people also speak an ethnic language such as Kazakh or Tajik, but all speak Russian.) NU was established as an English speaking university, and it turns out they’re quite strict about it. I made some headway arguing that strong communication is a prerequisite for effective team-based work, but I could see the participants were still uncomfortable reverting to Russian.
I’ve held women’s roundtables in many countries, usually leading with a few themes and then letting the conversation take its own course. These women were more forthright than in many other places, with a far-ranging conversation that even touched on sexual harassment and assault — a first in my travels. I also learned about a very strong cultural expectation that Kazakhstani women should be married with two children by the age of 25. That expectation doesn’t preclude college or even graduate school, as long as the women are simultaneously making good progress on husband and kids. To wit: NU provides married student housing for its undergraduates.
Reflecting on my visit, Kazakhstan and Nazarbayev University arguably lacked two of the main criteria I use for selecting “instructional odyssey” destinations: a developing country, and a university that doesn’t get many international visitors. Nevertheless it was an excellent stop, clearly appreciated by the participants, and rewarding and enjoyable for me.
