The paper is devoted to the history of manpower training among Kalmyk young people in the neighbouring regions. A special role in training of highly qualified specialists for the republic of Kalmykia belongs on Astrakhan and Astrakhan State University, established in 1918. After the Kalmyk autonomous region was joined to the Nizhnevolzhsky region in 1928, the Council of People’s Commissars of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic decided to organize a special Kalmyk section at the pedagogical faculty of Saratov State University in 1929-1930 academic year. Subsequently this section became known as the "Kalmyk department". By this time some reserve for higher education institutions was created. It consisted of the students of vocational secondary education institutions. Graduates of these schools may be university students in the near future. These and some other practical steps of central, regional and republican authorities gradually prepared necessary conditions for the qualitatively new stage in the development of higher education in Kalmykia.
