Introduction:
After 1990 the World politics has been changed
from Bio-polar to Uni-polar political system. The former Soviet Union was
disintegrated in new fifty independence countries. An influence of U.S was
increased in the World politics with the help of World Bank, IMF. Present
Russia accepted new changes in his economic policies and gave the new shape to
higher education. Education is tool of social and cultural development of any
society. This tool provides the knowledge and skills for each new generation. So
present Russian system have dismantled the old system and adopted new policies
in higher education. After twenty five years the several changes took place in
the education and new private universities, higher education institutions were
established for providing new education needs.
This new changes were accepted by Russians and they are moving towards
new phase of development.
Brief
historical overview of Russian Education:
The Russian model of higher education
went through an active phase of development in 18-19th centuries.
This process was significantly impacted by the German model of professional
education, the optimal one replicate at the time. Russia took on board not only
the values but also the institutional solution.
At the core of Russia higher education was
public universities. Their system was largely formed by the end of the 19th
century. On the eve of the first World War, Russia had over one hundred
universities, and 123,000 students. For comparison, France only had around
40,000 students at the time.
After the 1917 revolution, the
development of higher education was determined, on the one hand , by the industrialization
common for all leading world states, and, on the other hand , by the specific
political and economic rule of the new Soviet state. If we look at the Russian
Soviet Federative Socialist Republic’s accelerated industrialization goals, it
becomes obvious that the trends towards an increased share of technical
education, its massification and specialization were common for all educational
systems going through the industrialization phase. At the same time, higher
education became part of the Soviet planned economy: the amount of students,
disciplines and programmes were planned for each higher education institution
in accordance with the forecasted demand from various industries; the
development of the higher education system was subordinated to the national
economy needs in labour force.
The rapid expansion of higher education
system in the Soviet period is evidenced by the fact that from 1917 to 1940,
the amount of universities in the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist grew from
150 to 481, accordingly. The development of the system during this period was accompanied
by multiple waves of reorganization and optimization. However, starting from
the 1940-s , the structure of the university net work and the tools ensured the
interaction between the higher education system, labour and the technology
markets began to stabilize.
In 1950-1980, the changes to territorial
and industry structure of the higher education system did not make any radical
alteration to the model that had come in to shape by that time. Therefore, by
end of the 1980s, the USSR had a functioning machine of higher education, found
on the wave of industrialization and militarization of the national economy, in
the context of isolation from the global economy. The backbone of this system
was direct orders for personal training from the state.
Given the fact that educational system
was imbedded in to planned economy, the collapse of the USSR led an expected
crisis of the Russian education in the 1990. As it had often happened
throughout the Russian history, the internal crisis became a driver for
reevaluating the approach to reforming the system of higher education taking
into account the global trend of transforming to post –industrial stage of
development.
In the 1990s, on the background of
economic challenges, the higher education system came up against the need of
function in a market context, being totally unprepared for it, There was no new
basis emerging in the 1990s to replace the ties the needs of the Soviet planned
economy and industry. In this context, the growing massification and
commercialization of higher education were accompanied by a forced
transformation (without any preliminary plan) and subsequent new disproportions
on the labour market. For instance, this was manifested in the spike in the
number of universities (from 1990 to 2000 the amount of universities almost
doubled from 514 to 965, accordingly), include private universities; and in the
shift demand from technical discipline to humanities. As a result, by the end
of the 1990s, Russia had a segment of professional education that was not
focused on production. In professional education institutionsinsinstitutions,
fashion prevailed over employment.
Starting from 1992, Russian transitioned to multi-level
system of higher education and standardization. The Federal Law “On Education”
that came in 1992 introduced the concept of an educational standard in Russia.
Article 7 of law was dedicated to state educational standards.
Starting from 2003, the system of higher
education in Russia received an impetus to integrate with the European
educational space as part of Bolgana process.
The transition of the higher education
system in Russia from the industrial to post- industrial stage, as in case of
transitioning to previous development stage, was initiated by the state. A
conscious stage in the subsequent transformation of higher education system in Russia
became possible starting from the end of 2000s. The main prerequisite was the
financial stabilization in the country that ensured the basic possibility of
financially supporting the new reforms, and more impotently, created a
financially reliable basis for labour demand, reanimating the positive
industrial production development trends and creating the foundation for
economic growth.
Over the brief period from 2006 to 2013,
Russia succeeded in performing an optimization of the university network,
creating a nucleus of leading institutions as well as integrating the
university network into the territorial and production complexes by setting up a
sub-group of federal universities. This transformation stage was accompanied by
a legal framework reform (a new Federal Law “On Education in the Russia
Federation” from 29 December 2012 # 237-FZ); and set trajectory for the further
development of the country’s education system. For instance, the state machine
initiated a system of stared programmes and initiatives to support the
development of higher education. The highlights of the system was project “5 to
100”. On the university level , the need to determine the trajectory for
further development was manifested in the fact that strategic development
programmes became the agenda of the day. By the end of 2013 any university aiming
to receive state support, as a rule, had its own strategic development programme.
It was observe that the structure of
professional education in Russia over the last 10-15 years was unjustifiably
learning towards higher education. The university enrolment coefficient
calculated as the ratio of university enrolment to the number of 17- year olds
(this is the age most young people enroll in universities in Russia) in 2010
exceeded 90%. The massification and subsequent commercialization of higher
education in Russiahas completely changed the structure of professional education.
There was now an imbalance between the higher, middle and initial professional
education sectors. This trend determined a number of initiatives in the state
policy to promote middle and initial professional education, for instance,
Russian participation in the World Skills championships and the “Human
Resource” programme.
Resource allocation and
contribution of private sector:
The system of higher education in the
Russian Federation is primarily state. As OECED research shows, the share of
private expenditure on tertiary education (middle and higher professional
education) in Russia accounts for 37% of total expenditure (as 2010). This is
higher than OECED median of 7.1%
Currently, a significant share of
private expenditure is accounted for by personal education expenditure. After
the collapse of the USSR in 1990s, these became the key drivers for the
development of private institutions. Before the launch of the governmental
initiative to monitor university efficiency in the 2010/11 academic year, there
were 446 private universities (41% of the total number of universities) and 599
of their branches (36% of the total number of university branches)
The key issue with the development of
private higher education was in the initially opportunistic nature of its
explosive growth, when in according with the 1992 “Education Law” private
education institutionsinstitutions were given the rights to provide education
services on a paid basis. Unfortunately, the trend towards the
commercialization of higher education was not supported by ensuring the
required quality of educational services. As a result of the increase in the amount
of educational services provided by private institutions, the amount of
students enrolled in full-time higher professional education programmes was
only 15.5% (of the total amount of student)vs. 49.3% in public universities,
That means that 84.5% of private university students were pursuing extra-mural
studies.
It is worth noting that at the end of
2011, a federal law was passed to guarantee, among other things, the right of
citizens to receive higher professional education using the funds from corresponding
budgets, not only in public education institutions but also in private
professional education institutionsinstitutions with state accreditation. For
these purpose, the given law envisioned the possibility of financially
supporting the educational activates of said private educational institutions
through budget provisions from the Federal budget, the budgets of the subjects
of the Russian Federation, and local budgets.
On the one hand, this was a positive
sign of developing competition in higher education. On the other hand, this
tool is currently rather used to optimize the network of private institutions.
Reporting on the admission quotas in 2013. A. Klimoov , Deputy Minister of
Education and Science , said that the share of admission quotas to private
institutions is 0.5% of the total (1.03% in 2012). With the law (61%) economics
and management (46%) suffering the most decrease.
Distance Learning in Russia:
Russia has long background of distance
education since 1920 and it is provided conventional and open universities. Dr.
Irina Smirnova took the review of growth of distance education. According to
her observations the growth of DE and Open learning were rapidly fast after 1990. She said, “ ……….. New stage of distance started in early
1990 with introducing information
and communication technology (ICT) in to
education. The number of distance learning students in the Higher Education Institutions
(HEI’s) increased noticeably. In 1995 the National Concept Education was
launched. MESI and its partners initiated modifying the Law on Education, and
the article on distance education technology was approved.
New boost of distance education and distance
learning in mid-2000s was triggered by
rapid development of the Internet and ICT infrastructure in the country
. Now a days distance
learning is represented almost in all social segments;
higher education, secondary school, varied
kinds of industries and social
communities. Distance learning as acquiring new information, mastering certain
skills and self –education in
different fields with use of the
Internate. PCs and mobile devices has become daily practice for many ……..
Though at
present the fluent sharing information and hence distance learning more and
more affordable and accessible, the role
of HEIs
in distance education is still
very important and should
be higher in future. HEIs have potential for: navigation in the ocean of information
;quality assurance ; producing and sharing quality open educational resources ; creating and
advising on targeted paths towards mastering
skills and knowledge , especially professional ones ; providing
educational services for different target groups children to pensioners, etc.”
Role
of state for reforms:
The role of state was instrumental throughout the entire establishment
and development of higher education in Russia. It did not only form
institutional and conceptual basis of educational domain, but also provided
legal regulation that fact set the rules of the game and indirectly determined
the rate at which the system would
develop.
After the collapse of the USSR, starting
from 1992, all measured aimed at reforming the system of higher education were
essentially directed at refocusing it to function in the context of the
transition economy and at searching for ways to develop a national innovative
system.
From 1992 to 2013, the following key
points in the process of reforming the system of Russian higher education:
1.
Change made in order to integrate into the
international educational environment: transition to standardization and multi
level higher education system (1992); as well as Russia’s joining the Bologna
process (2003). The system of higher education was supplemented with various educational
and professional programmes of different levels in terms of nature and scope. It
was meant to sure the rights of Russian citizens to choose the content and
level of their education, and create the conditions in which the higher
education system could flexibly adapt to society demands in the context of
market economy and humanization of the educational system. Essentially, the multi-level
system was consequential to the emergence in Russia of market for educational
services, and was determined by the necessity to refocus universities from the
state to prospective students and their parents in the context of increased
demand for higher education.
2.
A
Unified State Exam was gradually introduced – a universal nation exam, in the
Russian gymnasiums (from 2001 to 2009). The Unified State Exam is both a final
exam at schools, lyceums and entrance exam to university. Until 2013, it was
also an entrance exam to specialized secondary educational establishments, but
the new law on education cancelled it. The Unified Stte Exam significantly
increased the mobility of prospective students and university differentiation
in terms of the quality of demission, decisively breaking don the previously
prevailing ties between regional universities and local enrollee flows.
3.
The
quality of education improved – higher education approaching real economy requirements;
renewed material and technical basis at universities; introduction of the
project approach and modern methods of management in the university
environment. This was implemented as part of a top- priority national project,
“Education” in the form of competitive selection and further support for the
universities innovative educational programmes
(2006-2008).
4.
“Growth
points” were determined – a pool of leading universities was formed (from 2008-
national research universities; from 2009- leading classical universities:
Lomonosov Moscow State University, Saint Petersburg State University; from 2006
– federal universities).
5.
A
system of measure was launched to provide state support for research activities
at universities- federal target programmes were subsequently supplemented with
new Decrees of the Government of Russian Federation(2007-2013). These support
measure were aimed at reanimating universities as research centers- in the
early days of the Soviet period this role had fully shifted to academic institutions.
6.
The
prestige of working professions was restored and the engineering training
system was improved. For instance, a regular competition of engineer
development programmes was organized order to support and promote the best
advanced training professional education programmes and internships for
engineers in the priority areas of
modernization and technological development of the Russian economy, developed
by Russian education institutions in responses to demand from and together with
specialized companies and organization operating in real economy sector.
7.
The
university network was optimized- the Russian
Ministry of Education and Science launched a regular monitoring of
university efficiency in order to recognize inefficient state institutions
(starting from 2012). This was a logical response to the dis crepancy between
the amount of universities and their branches ( at the beginning of the
2011/2012 academic year, there were 634 public education institutions and 1045
branches in Russia) to quality of their education .Replying on this mechanism,
the Ministry of Education and Science is planning to reduce the number of
public higher education institutions by 20%; and the number of their
branches by 30% by 2013-2015. According
to the 2014 monitoring, recommendations to improve their efficiency were given
to 238 higher education institutions and 772 branches, including 79 education institutions
and 489 branches that are subordinate to government authorities. Starting from
2014, the Ministry of Education and Science of Russia will no longer make the
education on which of the universities, academics or institutes needs to be
reorganized,i.e on the closures and mergers of higher education institutions
with stronger ones. The Ministry of Education and Science will now only
identify which higher education institutions need to improve their efficiency.
However, the decision on whether to close them, merge them with others or do
nothing will be solely in the hands of the founders. Previously, if a higher education
institutions found inefficient and in need of restructuring, such decisions
were mandatory.
8.
The
legal basis in the field of Russian education was reformed – with a new Federal
Law “On Education in the Russian Federation” from 2012. The goal of developing
the bill was to ensure comprehensive modernization of Russia’s laws on
education aimed at aligning it with the public relations in the field of
education; to enhance the efficiency of legal
control mechanism; to create legal conditions for the renewal and
development of Russian education system in accordance with the modern requirements
of people, the society and the state, the need to develop an innovative
economy, and Russia’s international obligations in the field of education.
9.
The
“5-100” project- creation of an action plan to develop leading universities in
order to enhance their competitiveness among leading global scientific and
educational centers (2012). The objective of 5-100projects is to maximize the
competitive position of group of leading Russian universities on the global
market of educational services and research programme.
Priority task:
The following priority task will be
required for development and quality improvement in education.
1.
To ensure the innovative nature of basic
education, including:
·
To
renew the structure of the educational institutions network in accordance with
the goals of innovative development, including the creation of Universities,
research centers,
·
To
ensure a competency building approach, and interconnectivity of academic
knowledge and practical skills.
·
To
renew the financial mechanism for educational institutions in line with the
goals of innovative development.
2.
To
modernize educational system institutions as instruments of social development
, including:
·
To
create a system of educational services to ensure the early education of
children regardless of place of residence , health and social situation;
·
To
create educational environment to ensure access to high-quality education and
successful socialization for people with limited capabilities.
3.
To
create a modern system of continuous education, training and retraining of
professional personal, including;
·
To
create a support system for the
consumers of continuous professional education services to support corporate
programmes to train and retrain professional personal:
·
To
create support system for organizations that provide high –quality services of
continuous professional education.
4.
To
form mechanism to evaluate the quality and relevance of educational services
with the participation of their consumers; participating in international
benchmarking studies by creating:
·
A transparent , open system of informing
citizens about educational services, that
would provide complete, accessible, up –to-date and accurate
information:
·
Macchnisms
to involve consumers and public institutions in controlling and assessing the
quality of education.
Apart from this Russian Federation has made a relevant and appropriate
changes in social orientation of education system, use ICT, State management,
youth policy, development of children. And also adopted a global approach for
development of education system. After the 25 years the Russia achieved a
maximum margin in development of education system. The changes have been seen in the various
universities and higher education institutions. This process will be continued
because the present Russia realized
benefit of a global approach in education.
Key word:
1.
Bolgana
Process: European countries designed to ensure comparability in the standard
and quality of higher education and
qualification.
2.
On
Education: Law of the Russian Federation no. 3266-1 of July 10, 1992.
References:
1.
Educational
System in Russia, the National Report of the Russian Federation, presented at
47th session The International Conference on Education Geneva, 8-11
September 2004.
2.
Kurilalla
Ivan, Reforming Russia’s Higher Education System, Ponars Eurasia Policy, Memo
153, May 2011.
3.
Jean-Kastueva
Tatiana articles on Higher Education, in Russie. Nei. Vision n * 28., April
2008.
4.
Saltykov
Boris articles on Higher Education in Russia: How to Overcome the Soviet Heritage?
in Russie Nei Vision n* 29 April 2008.
5.
Heyneman
P. Sthphen , A Comment on the Changes in Higher Education, European Education,
vol.42, no 1 (Spring 2010), PP-77-87.
6.
A
repot of European Commission, Higher Education in The Russian Federation, 2012.
file:///C:/Users/sanjay/Desktop/Distance%20Learning%20in%20Russia_%20Lessons%20Learned%20and%20Questions%20Raised%20%C2%AB%20Educational%20Technology%20Debate.html(* The above paper was read in to International Seminar on “ The Rise of New Russia” organized by Centre For Central Eurasian Studies, University of Mumbai and Shailendra College, Dahisar(E), Mumbai-400068 on Jan 29-30, 2016)
Dr. Sanjay Ratnaparakhi,
email:rsanjay96@hotmail.com
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