Mikhail Mishustin: “We need to do our best to ensure high-quality and affordable education in every Russian region, so that young graduates would stay in their home regions and would develop them, while working in their favourite fields.”
Mikhail Mishustin holds strategic session on development of education
Mikhail Mishustin holds strategic session on development of education
Mikhail Mishustin holds strategic session on development of education
Mikhail Mishustin’s opening remarks:
Good afternoon, colleagues,
We continue a series of the Government’s strategic sessions.
As instructed by the President, the Government is drafting a long-term national education development strategy until 2036 and up to 2040. In the next 15 years, this document will be expected to chart specific guidelines, as regards the work of our education institutions, including kindergartens, schools, technical schools and universities. Apart from merely serving as an action plan, it should become a full-scale and comprehensive programme. Its main objective is to establish a competitive and flexible education system, with due consideration for socio-economic requirements.
At the same time, it is very important that it strictly conform to the President’s national goal on implementing and unlocking the potential of every person and their talents and raising patriotic and socially responsible individuals.
At our previous strategic sessions, we discussed the most important issues of the national education system in great detail, and we exposed multiple problems. First of all, they were linked with a shortage of teachers and lecturers, especially those specialising in fundamental subjects, insufficiently high levels of their professional improvement and high loads imposed on educators and students.
Of course, it would be much harder to achieve technological leadership and to successfully implement national projects and other programmes needed for our long-term socio-economic growth and development, unless we answer these questions in the near future. First of all, the strategy’s measures should aim to boost the quality of the education system’s every level across the nation.
We implemented an entire range of systemic measures in previous years, and we modernised the infrastructure under the Education and Science and Universities national projects. We built about 1,700 kindergartens and 1,600 schools. We seriously upgraded equipment at 370 colleges. We opened 30 facilities, including campuses, dormitories and libraries. Over 9,000 researchers received workstations at newly-established youth laboratories. Fifty advanced engineering schools train highly skilled specialists in the most important fields. And we will continue to implement all these measures in accordance with the Youth and Children national project.
The Professionalitet project has made a significant contribution in improving the quality of vocational education. The president has instructed to formalise its implementation with the mandatory participation of businesses. As for universities, upon the president’s executive order, a pilot project has been launched to switch to a new higher education model that will have a single level: specialty. Under the master’s programme, it will be possible to obtain advanced knowledge.
The president stressed that it was necessary to largely redesign and fill curricula, revise training mechanisms, volumes and structure of employee training, and, which is very important, the planning of budget quotas based on the forecast of personnel needs and specific technological leadership projects. Colleagues, we discussed them during previous strategic sessions.
In this context, we will increase the number of target places in significant areas in the next few years. This decision has been made regarding almost 80 specialties for the next academic year. Let me give you some examples. These are aircraft and mechanical engineering; electronic systems and complexes; design, production and operation of missiles; and other important qualifications needed today. We have expanded the quota for several medical profiles to 100 percent.
We will allocate about 145,000 places for targeted training in total. This is a good chance for students to get a promising profession and a guaranteed job right after graduation. It is also important that they choose their future place of work themselves.
We need to do our best to ensure high-quality and affordable education in every Russian region, so that young graduates would stay in their home regions and would develop them, while working in their favourite fields.
Colleagues, how much the country will benefit from the strategy’s implementation depends from the joint efforts all the participants put in the process. Those high standards we have set can only be reached in close cooperation, using innovations, and focusing on Russia’s leadership in key areas. All our actions must be carried out in the interest of schoolchildren, students, teachers, and professors. Children who are studying now will soon go to work at some organisations or enterprises. Some would want to start their businesses. They will use the knowledge and skills they received from their teachers.
At the recent Council on Science and Education, the president emphasised that in order to solve the problems of today and the near future, it is necessary to form a reserve of competencies for years to come, so that students and educational institutions will also be able to respond to challenges and technological changes even after 15–20 years and be the best in the global competition. Of course, this necessity must be included when developing the new Education Development Strategy.
Today we must develop its main approaches and measures.
