Feature: Chinese university's Kazakhstan campus fosters talent, strengthens education ties

ALMATY, Oct. 9 (Xinhua) -- "Dong -- dong as in dongfang, the East."

In autumn-hued Almaty, the sound of students reciting Chinese drifts from a teaching building at Al-Farabi Kazakh National University.

Inside a classroom of Northwestern Polytechnical University's Kazakhstan branch campus, Chinese teacher Li Xiangning is teaching first-year students. Paper cutouts bearing the Chinese character "Fu," meaning good fortune, decorate the windows, while small Jade Rabbit lanterns hang from the door handles. Students repeat after her and carefully take notes.

The branch campus, an important cooperation project agreed upon by China and Kazakhstan during the first China-Central Asia Summit, opened in October 2023. It offers undergraduate, master's and doctoral programs and has trained nearly 300 Kazakh students.

Its undergraduate program mainly enrolls Kazakh students majoring in artificial intelligence (AI) under a dual-registration, dual-degree model, with students spending two years in Kazakhstan and two years in China.

"Here, I can learn both artificial intelligence and Chinese," said first-year student Yelissey Goncharenko, wearing a T-shirt bearing the emblems of both universities.

For second-year student Dinara Kamitkan, Chinese has been a seven-year journey. She began learning through online courses before receiving systematic instruction after entering the branch campus. She can now converse fluently in Chinese.

"I hope that after pursuing further studies in China, I can bring the knowledge and skills I learn back to Kazakhstan and use them to serve more people," she said.

In July, Dinara traveled with friends to Xinjiang in northwestern China, where she was impressed by both the landscapes and the level of digitalization.

"Whether watching videos online or visiting China in person, I can see the changes brought by artificial intelligence," she said.

Northwestern Polytechnical University has strengths in fields including AI, materials science, computer science, and information and communications. For students at the branch campus, learning Chinese also prepares them for further study.

Cooperation between the two universities has expanded beyond education.

In October 2024, the China-Kazakhstan Belt and Road Joint Laboratory on Materials Genome Engineering and Intelligent Science, jointly proposed by the two universities, was approved.

In December 2025, a China-Kazakhstan Agile Remote Sensing Key Payload jointly developed by the two universities was launched and completed in-orbit verification, providing technical support for ecological and environmental monitoring in Kazakhstan.

The branch campus has also begun producing graduates. Li Ziwei, vice dean of the branch campus, said eight master's students graduated in 2023 and 36 in 2024. Some continued their studies, while others found jobs or started businesses in Kazakhstan.

Li said the branch campus will continue improving its talent-training system, promoting educational connectivity under the Belt and Road Initiative and exchanges between young people from the two countries.