Almaty Akim Darhan Satybaldy announced in a policy article the introduction of uniform high standards for the megacity's schools and teaching staff, the website infohub.kz reports.
According to the city head, demographic growth and internal migration are increasing the burden on the education system year after year. "In order to reduce the shortage of school places, eight new schools were commissioned this year, and two more are planned to open by the end of the year. In addition, 69 new schools are to be built by 2030. But the quality of education cannot be measured only by the number of new buildings," the akim said.
He stressed that building a school is only part of solving the problem. "What matters far more is what kind of education a child will receive inside that school. That is why the 'Almaty School' model, which provides for uniform high standards for both the material and technical base and the teaching staff, will be introduced in all educational organizations in Almaty. This initiative will help narrow the gap in the quality of education and eliminate the imbalance in the distribution of workload among schools. Fairness in education begins with equality of opportunity," Darhan Satybaldy said.
According to him, the national project "Keleshek Mektepteri," implemented on the initiative of Head of State Qasym-Jomart Toqaev, is also giving a powerful boost to bringing Almaty's education system to a new level. To date, 21 schools with 34,800 student places have already opened in the city under the project.