Farkhad Kuanganov is a Lead Manager of academic excellence projects at the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Republic of Kazakhstan with 27 years of experience in working on governance reforms in various sectors of public and local government, including strategic planning, civil service system, project management in fields of education and science, healthcare, political activities. Now, he is the Head of the Project Office of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Republic of Kazakhstan, coordinator of a group of projects for the creation of Centers of Academic Excellence on the basis of regional and pedagogical universities, National Universities Ranking, national law elaboration for endowment funds, regional standards for the national qualification system managing and advanced personnel training, development of the startup movement in the higher education. As well Mr.Kuanganov took part in the elaboration of the first long-term national strategy “Kazakhstan-2030”, the Kazakhstani model of civil service, the program of vocational education development. He had led the project of world-class university creation in Astana (today Nazarbayev University), as well as the creation of a system of gifted children and youth support “El Umiti” (“Hope of the Nation”). He is the author of the youth upbringing program “Elbasy Medal”, an analogue of the “The Duke Edinburgh’s Award” program, as well as the developer of a new open model of science for Kazakhstan. Mr. Kuanganov holds Master of Public Administration from National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS, Tokyo), and a qualification of systems engineer (Kazakh Polytechnic Institute, today National Research Technical K.Satbayev University).