The proposal by the Head of State on splitting the Ministry of Education and Science into two departments is relevant and timely. Murat Baktiyaruly, member of the Senate of the Parliament, spoke on this matter. According to him, the ministry is responsible for more than 200 functions today. In addition, there are tens of thousands of educational institutions in the country. At the same time, the senator believes, that Kazakh science deserves special attention. The initiative to divide the department into two ministries was announced by the President during the anniversary session of the National Academy of Sciences in Almaty.
“The most suitable name for the first department is the Ministry of Education. It will include kindergartens, secondary schools, and colleges. The second department - the Ministry of Higher Education and Science will include universities and the field of science in general. However, I want to note that we are not inventing anything new. This practice was used in the period of Soviet Union. We talked about this last year, but the question is in need to be addressed right now,” said Murat Baktiyaruly, Member of Senate, Upper House of Kazakh Parliament.
According to the senator, the trilingual system of education should not be used in elementary grades. The deputy believes that Kazakh school children should receive their initial knowledge exclusively in the state language. And starting from the middle level, students can study other languages more in depth.
“My personal opinion, as a member of Parliament, is that Russian should be regarded as a foreign language. We have a foreign language subject. For example, there is Russian literature. Why do we divide Russian literature?! We divide foreign literature and Russian literature. Russia is a foreign country. Therefore, in the future, the child himself can choose what to learn - Russian, English, or Persian literature,” added Murat Baktiyaruly.
It should be noted that today in Kazakhstan there are more than 10,000 kindergartens, over 7,500 schools, 820 colleges and about 120 universities. Research and development work is carried out 386 organizations.
Translation and editing by Saule Mukhamejanova
