Paper long abstract:

In my paper, I would like to talk about significant achievements and some negatives, which are connected to the development of the Bologna process in Kazakhstan and Central Asia.

The education system in post-Soviet Central Asia was in the very difficult situation and had to adapt to new conditions, due to the socio-economic and socio-political crisis in the second half of the 1980s-early 1990s. In the 2000s, formed a national system of education quality assessment, discussed the optimal integration of the national education system in the world educational space, introduced in the educational process new information and credit technology, and conducted public debates on the transition to 12-year secondary education.

Undoubtedly the Bologna process reveals an aspiration of different countries towards the world educational space.

Kazakhstan was the first and (up to now) alone country in Central Asia to sign and ratify (1999) the Lisbon Convention on the Recognition of Higher Education Qualifications in the European Region, an important precursor to, and central instrument of, the Bologna Process. In 2010, Kazakhstan became the 47th member of the Bologna Accords and joined to the European Higher Education Area (EHEA)

The joining of Kazakhstan to the Bologna process gives real advantages for Kazakhstani higher educational institutions, faculty and students. So, Kazakhstan universities will inevitably integrate with the world research and education community under the open information and state of the art information technologies. Now Kazakhstan is on the way to become a Central Asian Regional Academic Center.

Kyrgyzstan is not a signatory to the Bologna Accords nor is it eligible; however, in August 2011 a government decree on transferring to a two-cycle system of higher education was issued, with course weighting to be expressed in ECTS credits.

The Tajik government signed and ratified the Lisbon Convention on the Recognition of Degrees in 2012. As in Kyrgyzstan, the Tajik authorities are trying to align their system of higher education with that of the Bologna model. The government has introduced the ECTS credit system as a pilot program in two universities - the Technological University of Tajikistan and the Tajik University of Commerce - and has a target of widespread adoption by 2020.

Now Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan are operating parallel systems of high education, one based on the European model and the other on the old Soviet model.

Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan are not a Bologna signatory (nor Bologna compliant).