Academic Mobility in the Conditions of Pandemic

The Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia (PFUR), on the basis of an agreement on cooperation in education and science and an agreement on academic exchange of students, sent 4th year students in marketing to study at Al-Farabi KazNU to strengthen international cooperation and improve the quality of the students' training.

Such format of exchange of undergraduate students has been tested for the first time and allowed KazNU to strengthen its competitive advantages in the educational space, regardless of the pandemic and relying on extensive opportunities for distance learning. To date, there is no sphere of activity unaffected by the spread of COVID-19. The effect of the coronavirus pandemic on the higher education system varies from country to country and from region to region. However, the overall vector of these changes can be traced: the pandemic has put universities in a difficult position, forcing them to adapt to current events in the shortest possible time, invest heavily in accelerated digitalization and often ignore possible consequences. The pandemic has had a negative impact on international cooperation in education and science: international travel has been cancelled, exchange and academic mobility programs for students and teachers and scientific cooperation have been suspended.

There were many pressing issues that had to be resolved in a short period of time: what form of distance learning could be conducted; what technical means should be used for this; and how to evaluate students' learning.

As we know, the pandemic has led to widespread online learning at all levels of the education process.

COVID-19 has also had a strong and mixed impact on international student mobility. After the Coronavirus crisis, universities will continue to fight for international students, but there is every reason to believe that the international education market will be even more sensitive and competitive due to the decline in living standards.

Within the framework of the Agreement on Cooperation in Education and Science and on the basis of the Academic Exchange Agreement, PFUR has sent its 4th year marketing students to Al-Farabi KazNU to take courses in online format in order to strengthen international cooperation and improve the quality of students’ training.

Al-Farabi KazNU plans to further develop its activities in the field of academic mobility. The University faces the task of establishing mutually beneficial business cooperation with partner universities in educational, methodological and scientific and cognitive activities in the field of economics: exchange of professors, invitation of foreign scientists to give lectures on marketing, logistics, joint student and faculty conferences, organization and conduct of joint projects.

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