AUCA New Campus Gala Opening

November 6, 2015

October 31, 2015, remarks the Gala Opening Ceremony of the American University of Central Asia (AUCA) new campus in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.

AUCA had the honor of hosting distinguished guests this day: U. S. Secretary of State John Kerry, Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration Mira Karybaeva, Minister of Education of Kyrgyzstan Elvira Sarieva, Vice President of Bard College Jonathan Becker, Chair of the AUCA Board of Trustees William H. Newton-Smith, representatives of the Open Society Foundations as the trustees from George Soros.

John Kerry talked and took photos with 20 students from Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan, and Kazakhstan. During the photo session, John Kerry asked students about their studies, their plans for future, and their hometowns.

From the Secretary Kerry’s speech: “This university, the American University of Central Asia, is the gold standard for teaching you students to think critically, to challenge the conventional wisdom – not to just be told something by a teacher, but to think about it and work it through your mind and challenge the teacher to substantiate the proposition that that teacher is giving you. That’s real education. This is not a place for the indifferent or for the cynical. This is a place for daring to be the absolute best that you can possibly be”.

“This new campus is special because it’s the first private construction project in Central Asia that is clean green all the way – that means geothermal heating and cooling, state-of-the art sewage, irrigation systems, and the highest standard of energy efficiency in the entire region”, John Kerry commented.  

President of Kyrgyzstan Almazbek Atambaev sent a congratulatory message on the Gala Opening of the AUCA new building. The message of the President has read Mira Karybaeva: “Founded in 1993, AUCA has become one of the most successful in the higher education system in Kyrgyzstan and produced many worthy professionals who come to us to study from more than twenty countries. Let this new building will be the center, where young people from all over the world will exchange ideas that will change the world, including Kyrgyzstan, for the better”.

"AUCA is a bright and significant collaborative project in the history of the Kyrgyz-US bilateral relations, and a successful example of private equity investment in education that have reached impressive results and high ratings, both national and international”, Elvira Sarieva said.

After all the invited speakers were finished, AUCA president Andrew Wachtel expressed his appreciation for those involved in the creation of AUCA’s new campus.

“The United States has been the inspiration for this entire university; especially the United States’ approach to higher education—what we call liberal arts education. It’s been modified by our experience in the Kyrgyz Republic; and certainly the Kyrgyz Republic is the only place in Central Asia where we would be able to operate, so I would like to thank the Kyrgyz government for making that possible. I also would like to thank our board, because without a board there is no university. I’d like to thank my staff who has spent the last six months going crazy trying to prepare this… And finally, I would like to thank our students, faculty, and staff because, in the end, the university is not about the walls… but it’s about the people who are inside the walls. Our students, faculty, and staff are an inspiration everyday. They make you want to come here in the morning, and make you not want to leave at night. I thank all of them for being who they are and wonderful people that they are”, Andrew Wachtel said.

The Gala Opening Ceremony was ended by a banquet and firework in honor of the opening of the new campus.

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