30 November 2013 | 23:58

Bolashak scholarship - opportunity for children of unemployed or retired

Photo © Marat Abilov

Bolashak scholarship is an opportunity for gifted children of unemployed and retired Kazakhstan citizens to study abroad, Tengrinews reports citing President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev as saying at the yesterday's anniversary forum of Bolashak Scholarship. Nazarbayev stressed the importance of the scholarship and the effect it had on Kazakhstan's development. “Almost two-thirds of the scholarship holders are children of employees of non-governmental structures, retirees; parents of 8 percent of the scholarship holders are unemployed. More than 200 scholarship holders are talented young people who have no parents - orphans, ” said the President. The education scholarship covers gifted contenders from all over Kazakhstan, not just from Almaty and Astana. “When we met 5 years ago at the forum dedicated to the 15 year anniversary of the program, I tasked the steering committee with making sure that citizens from all the regions of our country have access to the scholarship. We are doing this today: half of the participants are from non-central regions of Kazakhstan. And they return to their home areas after completing their studies, this is a very important part,” said Nazarbayev. Nazarbayev said that Bolashak scholarship holders were studying in the leading universities of the world that top the Shanghai rating. He emphasized the high efficiency of the Bolashak program which became “a means of upward social mobility for talented Kazakhstani youth”. “They study in world-renown universities, building up our country's creative nuclei of young scientists, teachers and managers. Bolashak has became a locomotive of our education system,” said the President. One of the graduates of the Bolashak Scholarship Program Gulbanu Berdiyarova said that her career was greatly influenced by the Program. “After graduating I was able to find work to put my knowledge into practice. Even more so, I am now specializing in the very area that I was focusing my research on during the studies. Neonatal surgery is new to the local health care, and we are still at the stage of training and learning,” Berdiyarova said in an interview to the Kazakhstan-2050 Strategy website. Speaking about the areas where the graduates are applying their knowledge, the President said that every second graduate “works in a Kazakhstan company, private or state-run one. “19% (of the alumni) work as managers in national companies, while 4% work in international organizations. All in all, three-quarters of alumni work in the real sector of the economy of Kazakhstan. 25% of Bolashak alumni work in public institutions, with 19% working in the state administrative agencies,” Nazarbayev said. According to the President the total of around 2000 engineers of various specializations have been trained thanks to Bolashak. "They are highly demanded for innovative and technology-intensive projects, metallurgy and communications," he specified. He also addressed the growing need for space engineers. “There are only 5 countries in the world that have cosmodromes. Kazakhstan is one of them. The space sector is infinite in time, extent and potential,” said Nazarbayev. The Bolashak Scholarship Program awarded to outstanding students to provide them an opportunity to study in foreign universities was established in 1993. At the 20th Anniversary Forum of the Scholarship this week, the President of Kazakhstan personally awarded the 10,000th scholarship.

Bolashak scholarship is an opportunity for gifted children of unemployed and retired Kazakhstan citizens to study abroad, Tengrinews reports citing President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev as saying at the yesterday's anniversary forum of Bolashak Scholarship. Nazarbayev stressed the importance of the scholarship and the effect it had on Kazakhstan's development. “Almost two-thirds of the scholarship holders are children of employees of non-governmental structures, retirees; parents of 8 percent of the scholarship holders are unemployed. More than 200 scholarship holders are talented young people who have no parents - orphans, ” said the President. The education scholarship covers gifted contenders from all over Kazakhstan, not just from Almaty and Astana. “When we met 5 years ago at the forum dedicated to the 15 year anniversary of the program, I tasked the steering committee with making sure that citizens from all the regions of our country have access to the scholarship. We are doing this today: half of the participants are from non-central regions of Kazakhstan. And they return to their home areas after completing their studies, this is a very important part,” said Nazarbayev. Nazarbayev said that Bolashak scholarship holders were studying in the leading universities of the world that top the Shanghai rating. He emphasized the high efficiency of the Bolashak program which became “a means of upward social mobility for talented Kazakhstani youth”. “They study in world-renown universities, building up our country's creative nuclei of young scientists, teachers and managers. Bolashak has became a locomotive of our education system,” said the President. One of the graduates of the Bolashak Scholarship Program Gulbanu Berdiyarova said that her career was greatly influenced by the Program. “After graduating I was able to find work to put my knowledge into practice. Even more so, I am now specializing in the very area that I was focusing my research on during the studies. Neonatal surgery is new to the local health care, and we are still at the stage of training and learning,” Berdiyarova said in an interview to the Kazakhstan-2050 Strategy website. Speaking about the areas where the graduates are applying their knowledge, the President said that every second graduate “works in a Kazakhstan company, private or state-run one. “19% (of the alumni) work as managers in national companies, while 4% work in international organizations. All in all, three-quarters of alumni work in the real sector of the economy of Kazakhstan. 25% of Bolashak alumni work in public institutions, with 19% working in the state administrative agencies,” Nazarbayev said. According to the President the total of around 2000 engineers of various specializations have been trained thanks to Bolashak. "They are highly demanded for innovative and technology-intensive projects, metallurgy and communications," he specified. He also addressed the growing need for space engineers. “There are only 5 countries in the world that have cosmodromes. Kazakhstan is one of them. The space sector is infinite in time, extent and potential,” said Nazarbayev. The Bolashak Scholarship Program awarded to outstanding students to provide them an opportunity to study in foreign universities was established in 1993. At the 20th Anniversary Forum of the Scholarship this week, the President of Kazakhstan personally awarded the 10,000th scholarship.

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