English
An important delegation of scientists and politicians from Kazakhstan visited the Mercator Research Centre and Fryslân on Thursday 3 and Friday 4 September 2009.
The Mercator Research Centre put together a programme with the Province of Fryslân and institutes such as Afûk (education and promotion of the Frisian language), Omrop Fryslân (broadcast company) and CEDIN (centre for educational services). The Kazakh delegation and the accompanying OVSE representatives also visited a number of tri-lingual primary schools and were impressed by the presentations. Focus of the visit was on language promotion and education. Kazakhstan is a huge country, 7th of the world, with an enormous diversity in ethnic groups and cultures. They already have a lot of experience in multi-lingual education but still there is a great need for knowledge and experiences of others. They also showed a great interest in the language promotion activities in Friesland and E-learning tools. With the Kazakh delegation the Mercator Research Centre / Fryske Akademy decided to share the interests in the future and to work towards a joint conference on these issues and to start discussions in order to develop a joint research programme.
