“Kazakhstan has built an effective training system for its athletes that allows them to excel in international competitions,” Vice Minister of Culture and Sports Saken Mussaibekov said at a May 4 media briefing. Recently, in Slovakia and Spain, Kazakhstan’s team took third place at the 27th Winter Universiade, winning five gold and six silver medals. A week ago, Kazakhstan’s men’s national ice hockey team, scoring four wins in a row in Group A of the first division, entered the top of the highest division for the 2016 World Cup. According the vice minister, such success is an indication of the quality of coaching success and the high quality of training of Kazakhstan’s teams. “Our students’ achievements are the result of very organised and painstaking training. In Central Asia, the future of winter sports is a hot topic and everyone knows that it will take a lot of resources to train our future generations of Olympians,” Mussaibekov said. Last year, there were 15,761 people engaged in winter sports. Today, Kazakhstan has quite a system of training for athletes that fosters them from their initial steps and guides them to the peak of their career. Regional and national sports training schools teach students the finest sportsmanship. Students from these schools are then inducted into Kazakhstan’s national teams, Mussaibekov said.
On May 3, the Bіrlіgі Mykty El Ozady Marathon, held in honour of the 550th anniversary of the Kazakh Khanate, began in Almaty. The marathon stretched from Almaty to Taldykorgan to Ayagoz to Akzhar and finished with the opening ceremony of the Dauletbai Batyr monument in the administrative centre of the Tarbagatai district of the East Kazakhstan region in Akzhar. “These events are the public’s initiative. The 550th anniversary of the Kazakh Khanate is connected with the people and heroes of that time; today’s youth need to know about them,” coordinator of the public socio-cultural movement Uly Dala Kyrandary Aidyn Yegeubayev said. He also noted that on May 6, at the House of Culture in Akzhar, the national scientific-practical conference was held. A five-metre tall bronze bust of Dauletbai Batyr was opened on May 7.
It is planned to open offices representing the Assembly of the People of Kazakhstan (APK) in all higher educational institutions in Kazakhstan, head of the APK Department at Gumilev Eurasian National University and member of APK Anatoly Bashmakov said at an April 30 press conference at the Central Communications Service (CCS). “An APK department has been opened at the Eurasian National University, not because it is located in the capital, but because this institution is a national resource. It is named after the great Russian Turkologist Lev Gumilev. His theories about ethnic passionarity [the rise of activity of an ethnic group along with its development] and kindness greatly overlap with the ideas of tolerance, peace and harmony held by the President of Kazakhstan,” Bashmakov said. According him, 14 such departments are currently operating across the country. Their goal is the development of tolerance and intercultural dialogue across the country. “These APK departments have three main focuses: carrying out socio-political work, educational projects and providing scientific support to APK projects,” Bashmakov said. The association of young historians of Kazakhstan is active in providing scholarly support to all APK departments across the country.
