ASTANA – Kazakhstan is working on industrial and innovative development, but that development is impossible without a highly-qualified technical staff.
Photo credit: The EKSTU. The EKSTU main building.
East Kazakhstan State Technical University (EKSTU) in Ust-Kamenogorsk, one of the oldest universities in the state, is working jointly with major local industrial companies. A very effective and modern university, it provides engineering and technical staff for the country.
The major academic centre of the East Kazakhstan region, EKSTU was included in the list of the 10 best universities of the state, training highly-qualified specialists for the second stage of the state programme of industrial and innovative development.
Photo credit: The EKSTU. Daulet Serikbaev
The university has three faculties, engineering, geoscience and IT and business, comprised of 22 academic departments with 84 educational programmes, including 41 specialties for bachelor’s degrees, 36 for master’s degrees and seven for PhDs.
Established Aug. 5, 1958, EKSTU was foundedto fill the rapid development needs of the East Kazakhstan region industry and became a critical necessity for engineering and technical staff. In 2005,the university was renamed for its the first rector, Daulet Serikbayev, a World War IIveteran and great scientist who made many contributions to the school.
In the difficult years of the 1990s, EKSTU didn’t strive merely to survive, but became one of several Kazakh universities providing multi-specialty education. At the time, the university had 23 specialties, six of which were unique to the young state. By1993, 17 scientific laboratories, three regional scientific centres and one experimental area were operating.
For many decades, the university has had excellent connections with the major industrial companies of the region. Such close cooperation makes training very effective, because companies can stipulate what specialists they need and graduates can translate their knowledge and skills into practice. As a result, all 86 academic departments organise their practical trainings, laboratories and professional accreditations in industrial companies within the region. The results of course work and graduation papers are implemented by the companies.
EKSTU has a well-developed scientific-innovative infrastructure and united technological chain, enabling it to realise projects from idea to production in fields such as metallurgy, advanced processing of natural resources, alternative energy, nanotechnology and new types of materials, machine construction, instrument engineering and automation of manufacturing activities, mathematic modeling and information and communications technologies, architecture and new construction technology.
Many university projects have succeeded and are used in practice. The development of innovative biotechnology for production of biologically-active additives for cattle and poultry was implemented at Bagration, a major ranch in East Kazakhstan. A workshop with a high-precision plasma-arc metal cutting and coating process using a Kawasaki robot was established under a corresponding university project. Technology and automatic press are currently being designed for nuclear fuel shaping and an experimental robot has shown excellent results.
Photo credit: The EKSTU. Kawasaki robot.
EKSTU management decided to use the best practices of the world’s foremost universities and chose four which have similar focus areas: Nazarbayev University, Tomsk Polytechnic University (Russia), Curtin University (Australia) and Otto von Guericke University (Germany). All are official strategic partners of EKSTU, which concluded corresponding cooperation contracts with them and uses their best practice in its own operation.
