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Many countries offer government scholarships for international higher education and expect the recipients to contribute to national development. While there are many benefits from these scholarship programmes, they have been criticized as expensive. We examine the perceived contribution of Kazakhstan's two government scholarship alumni to the development of the nation. Drawing on Kirkpatrick's model of evaluation, we explore the influence of government scholarships on Bolashak and Nazarbayev University alumni and their contribution at organizational and societal levels. Our findings show that both groups of alumni play important roles in developing local talent and contributing to the improvement of systems, practices, and policies within their workplaces and to wider socio-economic changes. Alumni are fostering social developments bringing attention to issues of environmental protection and political engagement. However, our findings also illustrate that underdeveloped industries, limited job opportunities in some fields, low salaries, bureaucratic management culture, and resistance to change limit alumni contributions. We argue that the problem is at the system level and that the national economy is lagging in human capital development. Our findings emphasize the critical importance of developing the economy in tandem with education and human capital development to reap greater benefits from the knowledge of international education graduates.

The use of international scholarship programmes is part of a long-standing approach to human capital development in many developing and middle-income countries that finance studies at universities abroad and locally. Yet, many scholarship alumni struggle to thrive in their home country and encounter numerous difficulties in their transition to the job market. This paper examines the employment experiences of Kazakhstan's government scholarship alumni in science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields and identifies the challenges they encounter navigating the labour market. Our analysis of 45 interviews demonstrated that although alumni hold a positional advantage in the job market and many succeed, there are also many alumni whose employability and career success are impeded by an intersection of socioeconomic and cultural factors, intergenerational clashes and scholarship programme regulations. The implications for scholarship programmes and government policy goals are discussed.

This paper examines employers' perspectives about university graduates' skills and preparation for employment in post-Soviet Tajikistan. It explores the mismatch between the skills university graduates acquire and the skills required in the job market, and addresses some of the underlying reasons for the perceived skills mismatch. Thematic analysis of interviews with employers' and secondary data suggest that the quality of higher education has declined considerably over the past two decades, widening the gap between the skills acquired by university graduates and those required by employers. The findings show that despite a rapid expansion of the higher education sector in Tajikistan, an increasing number of individuals are obtaining degrees, but fail to demonstrate a basic understanding of their field of study. I argue that while the skills mismatch derives from the challenges faced by the education system, a latent labor market and a weak economy are also contributing to the skills mismatch. The goals set by politicians and policy-makers, envisioning the internationalization of education and the preparation of the graduates to be responsive to the local and global labor market needs, seem far from being achieved in the near future. Employers' perspectives suggest that the reform of the education sector without the creation of more decent job opportunities will likely exacerbate the current skills mismatch in Tajikistan.

This article explores the employment experiences of government scholarship graduates from one master's degree programme at a flagship university in Kazakhstan. Analysis of interviews with graduates of a master's degree programme designed in response to a national policy agenda shows that graduates encountered numerous challenges transitioning from university to work despite obtaining a degree from a top Kazakhstani university. The key challenges included limited employment opportunities, hostile attitudes toward younger graduates, difficult working conditions and employers' misunderstanding of the new master's programmes. We argue that despite significant government financial investment in education, a weak enabling support system hinders graduates' career advancement and results in job mismatch and underutilization of skills. We suggest that policymakers need to shift debates on human capital development and graduate employability from supply-side factors to a more comprehensive model in which graduate employment is supported through the collaboration of the higher education system, industry, policymakers and graduates themselves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of international scholarship programmes is part of a long‐standing approach to human capital development in many developing and middle‐income countries that finance studies at universities abroad and locally. Yet, many scholarship alumni struggle to thrive in their home country and encounter numerous difficulties in their transition to the job market. This paper examines the employment experiences of Kazakhstan's government scholarship alumni in science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields and identifies the challenges they encounter navigating the labour market. Our analysis of 45 interviews demonstrated that although alumni hold a positional advantage in the job market and many succeed, there are also many alumni whose employability and career success are impeded by an intersection of socioeconomic and cultural factors, intergenerational clashes and scholarship programme regulations. The implications for scholarship programmes and government policy goals are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]