661 students from Turkmenistan study at Astrakhan State University, and over 800 Turkmen citizens have graduated from this university over the past three years. This statement came from the Rector of ASU Konstantin Markelov during his online remarks at the international conference “Healthcare, Education and Sports in the era of the Revival of a new era of a powerful state”, which was recently held in Ashgabat.
As the head of the largest university of the Astrakhan region stressed, Russia and Turkmenistan have been maintaining relations of strategic partnership and good neighborliness for many years, building an effective dialogue on regional security, economy, energy, education and science.
The rector told the conference participants that in order to create comfortable conditions and introduce the traditional values of the Turkmen people, a center of the Turkmen language and culture has been operating on the basis of the university since 2019.
Since 2014, the Astrakhan branch of the Association of Foreign Students has been operating, which has various fraternities helping accompanying students. Citizens of Turkmenistan form the largest community of the association — 44% of all foreign students.
“To further develop and strengthen cooperation with leading educational institutions of Turkmenistan, we are cooperating with the Turkmen consulate in Astrakhan and the representative office of Rossotrudnichestvo in this country. Joint activities are carried out on a regular basis with the Makhtumkuli School and the joint Turkmen-Russian Pushkin School,” Markelov added.
For example, he mentioned ASU’s participation in the strategic and academic leadership program “Priority 2030.” According to Konstantin Markelov, this initiative will open up new prospects for cooperation with partners from Turkmenistan in the field of education and innovation.
Thus, ASU plans to create a network system of interaction with partners in the Caspian Sea, and primarily with universities of Turkmenistan, with the participation of members of the Association of State Universities and Research Centers of the Caspian countries.
The Dean of the Faculty of Physics, Mathematics and Engineering Technologies Nikolay Vybornov, who personally attended the forum, also spoke on behalf of Astrakhan State University at the Ashgabat conference. He presented a report on “Practice-oriented approach in teaching and individual educational trajectories”.
In June of this year, a cooperation agreement was signed between Astrakhan State University named after V. N. Tatishchev and Turkmen State University named after Makhtumkuli. ///nCa, 14 October 2022