Global Education Program: Conducting field research and scientific analysis without interrupting teaching

The Global Education Program (GEP) project aims to address several challenges to increase interest and interest in the routine of online learning, as well as enable educators to conduct field research and analysis for scientific articles and publications without interrupting the teaching process. The creators of the GEP program and the pioneers are Professor of Practice - Dmitry Ogay and teacher Alisher Sadykov from the School of Economics and Finance of Almaty Management University.

The main idea of ​​the GEP is the integration of teaching and research activities (research and teaching approach - RTA). This transformation in education offers a chance and opens up new doors for faculty. Teachers receive greater opportunities for a variety of forms of content delivery, expanding the geographic audience of their students, and also increasing interest in the disciplines studied.

Moreover, for the learners, the relevance and timeliness, as well as the manner of presenting the material, are important, since it is Generation Z that pays strong attention not only to the information itself but also to how it is presented. This places an additional responsibility on the teaching staff not only to produce quality content in the classroom but also to work on the style of presenting information, as well as to keep up with the times and speak with students in their language. The teachers have already done a lot - they have mastered the technology. However, the content of the materials has remained the same, although online education implies not only changes in form, but also in content, which is what the GEP suggests. Within the framework of this program, Dmitry Ogay and Alisher Sadykov aim to integrate and cover the following courses: "Economics", "Statistics", "International Trade" and "Power BI". Also, the goal of this program is to study local markets in every currently available region in developing countries: Eastern Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, Central America, South America, Southeast Asia and Central Asia. These regions were not chosen by chance, they are all connected by the fact that their economies are developing, the countries in these regions have experienced a colonial past and are currently undergoing the process of decolonization. These regions had or do not have a completely democratic government, which leads to an increase in the role of the state in the economy, and most countries in these regions have not fully recovered from the coronavirus crisis and the pandemic in general. Moreover, these regions of the world are still dependent on the supply of raw materials to the world economies, and the middle class is just emerging. These factors are of great research interest. In addition, field analysis and interviews with representatives of science and education, the public sector, entrepreneurs and representatives of the corporation, as well as generation Z in these regions will answer the following questions:

• How is the recovery of the economies of the developing countries of the world going?
• What was the support from the state during the quarantine of the SME sector?
• How are the competitiveness and national branding of countries developing?
• How are countries rebuilding international trade, foreign investment and tourism?
• What is the unemployment rate in the region?
• What products represent a competitive advantage - assess reality versus statistics?
• What do people prefer - to spend or invest?
• What are the trends in economic growth?

Such a field study and publication of the results will make it possible to give specific recommendations for the economies of Central Asia and Kazakhstan in particular. It is worth noting that Almaty Management University is part of the CINTANA Alliance (https://www.cintana.com/cintana-alliance/), which aims to create a global network of promising universities working together to give each of its students the best higher education. It is this alliance that becomes a platform for cooperation and communication between professors and teachers, as well as one of the main platforms for the implementation of the Global Education Program since this alliance already has representatives from the Middle East, Turkey, North Africa, Central and South America, and Asia. 

Thus, the first region in which research was carried out, meetings with representatives of the academic community, small and medium-sized businesses, as well as lectures for students, was the Balkan Peninsula, in particular - Montenegro. If we talk about the main results of the first stage, then the Global Education Program team achieved the following:

1. Relationships have been built between AlmaU and the system-forming higher educational institution of Montenegro and the Balkans - The University of Montenegro;
2. A partnership has been built for a possible academic exchange of students and teachers between Almaty Management University and The University of Montenegro;
3. Writing an article on the results of the trip: "The concept of national branding for the country's economy - a case example of Montenegro for the country of Central Asia";
4. Obtaining an invitation from the OSCE Academy (Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan) to the conference on October 4-6, 2021 for the presentation of this article;
5. Prepared video content for placement on video platforms AlmaU;
6. Global positioning of the AlmaU community and the creation of background by the field method;
7. Ways are open for finding oneself and striving for self-development. GEP is not only about increasing interest in learning among students, but also expanding opportunities for teaching and interesting presentation of content by teachers.

It should be noted that due to the temporary absence of sponsors, each participant of the program assumes all financial expenses. The next regions planned by the Global Education Program to study, conduct field research, and analyze and build bridges of relationships between universities are North Africa and Turkey (until the end of 2021).

We wish success to the project participants and look forward to news from field research and new lectures for students from Africa and Turkey!