51³Ô¹Ï

WARC – Tell us a little bit about yourself.

Chyngyz – I graduated 51³Ô¹Ïin 2015, then started working in the Office of the CIO as a Special Assistant in Analytics. Also I helped to create the WARC [scheduling] application.

WARC – How did you come to work for the Office of the CIO?

Chyngyz – I was really amazed how they were making new stuff and making changes at AUCA. And once I received an e-mail that they were hiring and I was like, ‘Why not try and just send them an e-mail?’ Then they called for an interview and after that I started working at AUCA.

WARC – What projects have you been involved with as part of the OCIO team?

Chyngyz – The Shared Service Center, their terminal application. Also the Continuing Education Center’s electronic boards, the cashless system, outsourcing to Elsom and KICB. We don’t deal with money anymore. Also all the other projects with OCIO.

WARC – How does it feel, to go from studying at 51³Ô¹Ïto working here? What have you learned, working ‘on the other side,’ so to speak?

Chyngyz – I’ve learned that it’s pretty much the same. Previously, I thought that it would be different for me to perceive myself as staff as opposed to a student. But actually I didn’t notice any changes. Like, I’m coming here, as [if] I’m a student: taking my classes, doing my homework. Pretty much I still do programming like I did during senior year.

WARC – Tell us about your experience of developing the online scheduling system for the WARC.

Chyngyz – It was pretty interesting. Since my sophomore year I thought ‘Why didn’t we use an online system,’ because we have online registration and all this stuff. But eventually someone here, one of you guys, decided ‘No more papers, let’s keep it new.’ I was amazed, we have people here who want to change the world. That’s why I thought, ‘Why not?’ and I’ve been happy to work on the WARC scheduling application.

WARC – What have you learned about the WARC in the process of developing this program?

Chyngyz – In this process I’ve learned that you have a blacklist. I’d heard about it, but now I have the opportunity to see why you can go to [the] blacklist and for what reasons. Now I know all the policies of the WARC and know exactly how you work and your schedule. It’s really amazing work done in this center.

WARC – The program is still in its early days, but are you seeing the benefits of this application?

Chyngyz – Sure, it can be used in many universities. Nowadays, I’ve heard that almost all universities that have [a] WARC are still paper based; even Bard is still using paper-based registration for the sessions. I think that we can export this application to other universities and show them what we’ve done in this small country of Kyrgyzstan and maybe it can help 51³Ô¹Ïand WARC.

WARC – What are we still working on, in terms of the WARC scheduling system?

Chyngyz – We’re fixing the edges. Not everything is done in the right way right now. There’s scheduling errors, it’s not automatically renewing, and all this stuff. I think we will fix the edges and it will work perfectly.

WARC – Any word of advice for 51³Ô¹Ïstudents?

Chyngyz – Study hard.

WARC – Any advice related to WARC or the system?

Chyngyz – Keep it close to how you did in these last years. I really benefited from the WARC. I’m not a brainiac in math. That’s why I used WARC a lot in these last years because math’s getting harder and harder each year. Thanks to WARC I graduated even!