The upbringing of a multilingual competitive specialist capable of dynamically orienting himself in a new language, political, economic and social environment is a priority objective of modern higher education.

The activity of the department of general linguistics and European languages is directly related to this goal, as a whole series of events (olympiads, contests, round tables, seminars, etc.) are held along with the educational process at the Department of General Linguistics and European Languages throughout the year, the annual intellectual Olympiad "The best Linguist" takes place. This event is traditionally held by the club "Young Linguist", whose members are students of the Faculty of Philology, undergraduates, doctoral students of the specialty "Linguistics", interested in the problems of modern linguistics. The scientific advisors of the club and the Olympiad are the teachers of the department - Doctor of Philology Zh.K. Ibraeva and Candidate of Philology M.K. Mambetova. The Olympiad is held with the purpose of revealing and developing students' creative abilities and interest in research activities, promoting knowledge of languages, and promoting the professional orientation of future specialists.

On the 28-th of March, 2018 took place the 1^st qualifying round of the Olympics. This year more than 100 students from the leading higher educational institutions of the country took part in the qualifying round. The contestants competed in the knowledge of the state, Russian and English languages. Tasks in the tests assumed knowledge of both linguistic disciplines, as well as checking the wit and logic of students. The main round of the intellectual Olympiad was held on April 27, 2018 in the library of al-Farabi KazNU. As a result of the competitive selection, the right to represent their university fell to the teams of five universities: the Kazakh National Pedagogical University named after Abay, the Kazakh Women's Pedagogical University, the University of International Relations and World Languages named after Abylaykhan, the University of Suleiman Demirel and the Kazakh National University named after al-Farabi. Teams with honor withstood the main stages of the Olympics, which were held in three languages: Kazakh, Russian and English. Linguistic knowledge of the students were able to show on the tour "Baige", when within 1^st minute it was necessary to answer questions of genealogical and typological classifications in the Kazakh language. Students determined the genealogical and typological prinazhlezhnost different languages. Difficult for some teams was the tour "Kokpar", where the teams had to demonstrate their knowledge in general linguistics and linguistics. Special interest among participants and spectators was caused by the tour "Polyglot", which was conducted by American students Chase Riggel and Alexander Idarraga, who study at the KazNU under the international program "Flagman". Based on the results of all rounds, the team from the University of Suleimen Demirel became the winner of the republican intellectual Olympiad "The best Linguist-2018". Prize-winners and participants of the Olmiad were awarded with diplomas and memorable prizes. This year's competition was organized by the "Young Linguist" club of the General Linguistics and European Languages Department, the Center for Russian Language and Culture (Director: Prof. J.M. Umatova) and the Public Foundation named after Kulmat Omiraliev