ASU Centre of Uzbek Culture and Language Will Open in November

That is what ASU Rector Konstantin Markelov reported at his meeting with Khuzhabakhlil Asamanov, the Head of the Consulate General of the Republic of Uzbekistan in Rostov-on-Don.

The project of the centre was presented this spring at the Interregional Conference of Rectors of Russian and Uzbek Universities. It has already been shaped up: the university has found a convenient place to allocate the centre — a new academic building of ASU in the city centre — and now is actively developing respective programmes.

The Consulate of Uzbekistan is keeping a close eye on the project. They have already passed some visual materials, books and national symbols to ASU and also expressed their readiness to help with development and implementation of a design project for the offices so that the design corresponds to the national traditions.

The work of the new structure will me aimed at promotion of the Uzbek language and culture in the Russian-speaking environment. The Consul suggested that there were volunteers from Uzbekistan among future teaching staff of the centre — they will both share their knowledge with Astrakhan citizens and hone the Russian teaching techniques to implement them in their country afterwards.

Over time, there may be plans on implementation of BA and MA language programmes in the centre, and citizens of Uzbekistan also will be able to obtain the qualification of teacher of Russian as a foreign language there.

Konstantin Markelov and Khuzhabakhlil Asamanov also discussed prospects of implementation of other joint educational projects. Now ASU is training about 70 students from Uzbekistan, and the Rector hopes that the number will eventually grow.

The parties also mentioned archeological studies, engineering surveying and agricultural developments among the areas of cooperation between ASU and Uzbek universities.