President's address: focus changes – in present time
February 1, Almaty Management University held a discussion on the annual President's address to people of Kazakhstan. On January 30, the President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev announced the next message to the people of Kazakhstan, and on January 31 it was published on Internet-resources of the country.
That evening everyone could share the priorities of the Address he noted for himself and what in the speech of the President seemed to him the most important and relevant.
The rector of the University Almagul Kanagatova noted that the country's dynamic development has become possible because the people of Kazakhstan has a solid foundation in the form of values, traditions: "Development cannot arise in a vacuum. There was hard work of many people, there was the idea, there were values. In future we must continue to cultivate our values. Implementation of the assigned tasks will be impossible without them."
A. Kanagatova also stressed that today AlmaU takes one lead of the thoughts and ideas expressed in the address by the President of the country. "Dynamic development" is not just words, it is a basic trend of world economic development. "If earlier the large ate the small, today the fast eat the slow,- the rector said, - So, it’s naturally, that we should be ahead, if we want to keep and strengthen our positions".
Speaking about the idea of the address about "digital Kazakhstan", Almagul Medikhatovna said that on February 4 at the University a specialty Big Data (Global data) will be opened under the auspices of the School of engineering management. "Software engineering, training professional managers in this sphere is an important direction of our work. Companies often ask the question: why the University, known for its positions in management, business, marketing, suddenly takes IT and Big Data? Actually, there is no contradiction. We are on course for the development of AlmaU as an entrepreneurial University, but without the development of engineering and IT-direction no University can be advanced today. The Address makes a special focus on the industrial revolution, technology, digital Kazakhstan. There is a phrase, the value of which we feel especially deeply: the fact that today there is a gap between the digital generation of students, schools, universities and non-digital generation of teachers. Of course, this is clearly evident in the tools of teaching. Therefore, we can say that we have been living for long time with the key concepts which are defined in the Address."
Advisor to the rector for academic development Irina Khan in her speech said that, as a philosopher, she was most interested in priority that is associated with the development of human capital: "But what is human capital? It's not just the number of people, it's not just the division by gender, age or profession. The main division must be according to the principle: people active (proactive) and passive people who live, because they woke up, had breakfast, because there are place to sleep and people to communicate with. But this standard format is also good if a person sees himself this way, if he has no other goals. But if a person, especially young, has ambitious goals and objectives, and he wants to live differently, in a different format. The higher our goals are, the more we achieve. And our President is trying to convey to us the understanding: you should not underestimate your ambitions, your self-esteem. You should not put low, normal, observable goals. And all addresses of the President say that our country has always set very high goals. Just 20 years ago there was the first phase of modernization - 90- s when there was a heyday of crimes when crowned thieves determined everything, when our children answered the question "what do you want to be?" - "Racketeer". The second wave of modernization came when we had already passed the transition period and came to a market economy, when books, art, cinema, ideology become valuable again. And now the third stage came. The fact that we have gathered to discuss the President's Address says that now we are in the framework of global competitiveness. And we are ready to develop and compete with other countries."
Aslan Beksultan, a 3rd year student of the specialty "Public relations", thinks that for students the part of the Address, which refers to modernization of the labour market is especially important: "Today we are students, tomorrow we will work in companies, perhaps as employers. Therefore, we must know what is happening in the labour market, what opportunities we have and where we are going. It is also very important for us students is a message of radically changing and improving business environment. What industry is better to implement your own startup? What requirements it (a startup business project) should comply with? The loan of what extent we can get? You can find answers for all of these questions in the Address, the laws, Presidential Decrees and governmental Regulations. So, in his annual Address the President noted that today it is necessary to deal with promising sectors: 3D printing, online trade, mobile Internet, communications, digital technology, etc. The human capital can replace by computers, robots and artificial intelligence very soon. In this context, it is very important for us, students, to study the trends and tendencies of the labour market and economy, and know where to move."
Students, representatives of clubs and student activists expressed their vision of the Address, as well as their thoughts, fears and hopes. So, they noted that it would good if the center of changes and reforms was focused not on the future but on the present – because many things need changes now. In general, fully according to the Address, where it is said, "Only those people who will be able to determine the future and decisively meet challenges, not standing and waiting, are the winners... In the world next, the Fourth industrial revolution has already started".
