In the period from 1973 to 1992, the ZHAMBYL HYDROMELIORATIVE-CONSTRUCTION INSTITUTE was headed by the academician, Doctor of Technical Sciences MARS FAZYLOVICH URKUMBAEV. (He assumed the post of rector at the age of 33 and was the youngest head of a higher educational institution in the Union). With his arrival, a qualitatively new stage began in the activities of the university. New specialties in demand in agriculture, economics, irrigation and drainage, and construction have opened.

“In the 1973-1974 academic year, about 3,500 children studied at the full-time department, they were mainly guys,” M. Urkumbaev later recalled. - We tried to give students not only good knowledge, but also to instill in them a culture and spiritual values. Particular attention was paid to the development of sports. It was during these years that we discovered Serik Konakbaev, Sergey Gromov, Almas Musabekov for the country. If at first only 30-40 people were engaged in the boxing section, then after Serik Konakbaev won the World Cup in New York and became the silver medalist of the Moscow Olympics, up to 1400 people began to attend the section. A significant event was the opening of the faculty “Economics of Water Management”, which girls began to enter. Young people fell in love and fastened their feelings with the bonds of matrimony. For family students, we built a hostel number 3 ".

In those years, students not only studied, but also took part in the construction and arrangement of their own university. Under the slogan “Do it yourself with your own institution”, they built new educational buildings and dormitories, converted the chemical fertilizer warehouse into a modern laboratory, and improved the site for the military department. Thus, a whole educational campus was created, which later became known as the “Hydrocomplex”.