Conversations About Complex Issues: the emerging national system of higher education

This time TSU Rector Eduard Galazhinskiy shares his insight into how the development of the higher education system based on the national interests of our country is being discussed by the academic community.

- Professor Galazhinskiy, time has come, as they say. The deadline for the implementation of the upcoming reform of the higher education system is clearly indicated as July 31, 2023 in the instructions for the implementation of President Putin's February Address to the Federal Assembly. What should we all expect by this date?

- Since these instructions were addressed directly to the Government of Russia and the Administration of the President, we should expect reports from Mikhail Mishustin, Chairman of the Government of the Russian Federation, and Andrei Fursenko, Aide to the President. The reports are expected to contain very specific proposals on making the necessary changes to Russian legislation. According to the content of these instructions, it becomes clear what the main “reference points” of the upcoming reform are and what its most general “framework” must be. There will be basic higher education and there will be specialized higher education — master's, residency or assistantship. Basic programs will last from 4 to 6 years. Postgraduate programs will become an independent level of professional education, which will provide for the training of scientific and scientific-pedagogical personnel. Universities will have the opportunity to establish educational programs with different terms of study within the same direction or the same specialty. It is clear that the terms of training will depend on the specific qualification, sector of the economy or social sphere. The introduction of all changes will be phased, with preliminary testing of the proposed training models. Education and qualifications acquired prior to the changes will be fully recognized unconditionally, as will be the academic and professional rights of their holders. So there is no need to worry about the diplomas that have been obtained or those diplomas that will be received in the coming years as we transition to the new system of higher education.

– As you know, this reform of higher education is not the first one for our country. How is this reform different from previous reforms?

– Firstly, Russian society has never been so unanimous in its opinion that higher education urgently needs a radical restructuring. Former reforms were initiated, as a rule, administratively. For universities and their staff, they were often unexpected, poorly motivated, and poorly understood. But the complexity of the current moment, among other things, is that different experts, representatives of various professional and public organizations, and also ordinary citizens view this necessary restructuring of higher education in very different ways. Secondly, I don’t remember any previous reforms being discussed so widely and with such involvement not only in expert communities and the media, but also in social networks. Thirdly, deep transformations in the field of higher education will take place against the backdrop of no less profound transformations in other spheres of our society, which increases the risks of the transitions of the higher education system and the whole society to the brink of chaos. That is why we should not rush in and make seemingly obvious, but ill-considered decisions. In fact, we are not even talking about reforms, but about the comprehensive formation of a higher education system that is fully focused on the national interests of the country.

- "Comprehensive formation" can also be understood in different ways. For some, it is the scrapping of everything that we have now; for others, it is the building up and development of what have now.

- In this case, it is a synthesis of all the best that we had in the Soviet system of higher education, and the experience of recent decades. This particular approach was voiced by President Vladimir Putin in his February Address to the Federal Assembly. The Minister of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, Valery Falkov, has repeatedly spoken about it. In his report at the meeting of the Russian Union of Rectors on April 19, he especially emphasized that "it is time to move away from the opposition of bachelor's and specialist's degrees, to take the best from them and to reach a qualitatively new level — basic higher education with flexible terms of study and programs." The discussions, taking place in the Russian Union of Rectors, show that the vast majority of its members support such a vision of the reform.

- And yet, part of Russian society, or at least its older generation, clearly expect a direct return to the traditional Soviet single-tier system of higher education, that is, to a five-year specialty. And now they are wondering why this is not happening.

– Indeed, for many people, the Soviet system of higher education still seems to be much more understandable and effective in many respects. For example, the quality of training in engineering, technical and natural mathematical areas, as well as training and production practice at enterprises, and the readiness of graduates to work in production immediately after graduation. And, by the way, this is the most important aspect which needs to be restored and “synthesized”. So why would a direct return to the Soviet system be the wrong decision today? There are no systems that are equally effective for all conditions and all times. I could give many arguments to confirm that today the exact repetition of the past can only cause new colossal problems for our country. However, due to the limited format of our conversation, I will focus only on the following.

The heyday of the Soviet system of higher education came in the 1950-1960s, which was then confirmed not only by statistics (the highest number of students in the world per 10 thousand inhabitants) and the opening of a huge number of higher educational institutions of various profiles, but, most importantly, by outstanding scientific discoveries and technical advances. First of all, in space, defense and development of natural resources. At the same time, the general level of scientific knowledge and technology remained, so it was still possible to somehow fit it into university five-year educational programs. The speed of technological development was also relatively low. For example, the State Planning Committee of the USSR could plan the number of engineers needed for the country for 5 to 10 years in advance. Today, the general level of scientific knowledge is so high and its volume is so great that five-year-long university programs are no longer able to accommodate it. And the rate with which new technologies emerge is so high that it is no longer possible to predict with the same accuracy how many specialists of one or another field or profile will be needed in the next few years, not to mention longer periods. By the way, it is precisely the speed of development of modern technologies that often prevents a graduate from starting to work effectively immediately after graduation. While at the university he or she was taught to master one technology, the enterprises have already managed to master others!

All of this requires a completely different approach to the structure and content of domestic higher education. Hence, its two-level structure is not a copy of the notorious "Bologna system", but one of its main principles, which naturally follows from the current state of affairs. In Soviet times, for 5 years of study in a specialty, a person received both fundamental and special scientific knowledge, and, in fact, professional and general cultural training and practical skills necessary to perform professionally. Today, when most professions do not last long, outside of fundamental scientific and basic professional knowledge and general cultural training, one needs to master soft skills - develop critical thinking, the ability to communicate effectively and work in teams. With such a background, university graduates can work and study further, if they wish. This is the “core” of higher education that many of my colleagues are talking about now. This, in my opinion, is what the first (basic or fundamental) level of higher education should be focused on: fundamental knowledge, the most necessary basic professional knowledge, general cultural training plus the ability to work with one’s potential and the “flexible” competencies listed above. It is quite possible to master all of that in four years.

Of course, in order to finally determine the period of basic education (4, 5 or 6 years) in a particular sphere, it is necessary to take into account the nature of the future professional activity and the level of qualification for which graduates of this particular specialty or bachelor's degree are intended. At the same time, as stated in the February Address of the President, even within the same specialty and one university, programs of different training periods can be offered, depending on the specific profession, industry and labor market demand. Today, many agree that, for example, a five-year specialist's degree is most suitable for all technical specialties and, perhaps, for the training of specialists in sectoral management. But not only for them. For example, the five-year basic training program (bachelor's degree) has been operating for many years at the Moscow City Pedagogical University, whose graduates mastered two profiles at once: "elementary school" and "foreign language". I think that by and large it doesn't matter what the first level of higher education is called. The main thing is its purpose, content and quality.

– The question may arise, how does a one-year master's degree differ, for example, from a one-year professional retraining?

- Some experts see only a purely formal difference: a master's degree is education at the expense of the state, and vocational retraining is at person’s own expense. But Tomsk State University has a different view. Having received a basic higher education, a person can delve into the same area using research methods, and in such cases it would be a master's degree; or this person may want to gain basic knowledge and practical skills in a related or completely different profession, then it would be professional retraining.

- Can you give an example?

- Yes, I can. Suppose a person wants to qualify as a specialist in working with full-fledged dialogue systems and generative models such as ChatGPT, that is, to professionally master a new user qualification: set tasks for an artificial neural system, to work with prompts and help other users understand how to use this technology in their professional fields. In this case, an appropriate professional retraining program can be launched. The master's on ChatGPT as a new field of knowledge and practice will include a research component that will be a part of the professional activity. That is, in the first case, we simply teach how to use this technology in a qualified manner, and in the second, we learn to change and develop this technology, raise problematic questions, formulate and test hypotheses, create a tool (methodology and techniques) for using this technology, while changing activities, in to which it applies.

But I would like to return to the arguments in favor of a two-tiered system of domestic higher education. Russia is still among the countries with the largest number of international students. It is clear that the education of international students is aimed at the formation of sustainable loyalty to our country of those foreign government agencies and commercial companies in which our graduates will work in the future. Ultimately, this is a type of soft power. If we do not want to lose such an important resource, we must make sure that the structure of our higher education system is understandable to potential international applicants and is comparable to that adopted in most of the other countries. And there are always two levels. China, for example, is not formally part of the Bologna system, but the structure of Chinese higher education also includes two levels: undergraduate and graduate.

- Everything seems to be adding up, and all that remains is figuring out the details?

- Many people know the expression “the devil is in the details”, which means there are nuances that are imperceptible at first glance, but which strongly affect the outcome. The discussion of the emerging national system of higher education on various platforms is just an example of identifying such “details”, or rather, problematic issues on which the expected reform can stumble. For example, by what criteria and who should determine the terms of basic and advanced higher education in each specific area, or whether the field of the master's degree should be strictly tied to the corresponding field of basic higher education, and so on. Moreover, each new problematic issue entails a bunch of other problems that were not obvious at first.

- Have you opened Pandora's box?

If it had not been opened now, sooner or later it would have opened by itself. It is better to discuss everything before the adoption of new legislative decisions on higher education than after that. The Government of the Russian Federation and the Administration of the President prepare many laws and regulations. Often this is what happens: first they issue a law, then they look at what happens, and if something doesn’t work out, they correct it with by-laws. The system flounders, and everyone takes their bumps and bruises until it stabilizes and starts to work more or less efficiently. Today, this method is too resource-intensive for the country. Therefore, I support the position that first we need to have a good discussion, and then pick up speed and move forward, step by step, gradually, without breaking what works.

At the same time, it is necessary to understand that there have always been, are and will be both supporters and opponents of any reforms. Those whose arguments are stronger and those who show more initiative win. Before making a final decision on a particular issue, it is necessary to know the opinion of both supporters and opponents of the proposed decision. It is this reflection of different points of view that is taking place today in the academic and expert communities. It is an active dialogue of all interested parties in order to discuss all possible opinions on the construction of a national higher education system is what is most needed at this stage. And I would like this issue of my blog to be seen as one of the responses to that call.

- What points would you like to emphasize in your response?

- There are several of them. First, of course, the new system of higher education must reflect, above all, the national interests of Russia. However, in an effort to preserve our identity and uniqueness, we should not completely fall out of the general context. Therefore, from an unequivocal globalist concept, on the basis of which the Bologna system exists, we must move to a policy of combining our national interests with the formats of higher education generally accepted in the world.

Second, the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection of the Russian Federation and the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation should be involved in the process of forming a new Russian system of higher education, not in the role of "independent observers", but as active partners of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education. Many of today's problems of higher education are due to the fact that decisions on a number of critical issues that require adjustments in three areas at once (labor, higher, secondary specialized and school education) and, accordingly, approvals from three ministries at once, were taken completely or almost independently of each other. Let me give you an example: we often hear that higher education is cut off from the labor market. This is largely due to the situation described a few years ago in an article by the Executive Director of the Association of Classical Universities of Russia, Evgenia Karavaeva. Its main idea was as follows: the harmonization of labor market requirements and the competencies of university graduates is hampered by the imperfection of the National Qualifications System.

Not much has changed since this article was published. Meanwhile, my colleagues from the Association of Classical Universities, the Russian Union of Rectors and the network project "University Education Quality Initiative" believe that both the terms of study at universities and the federal state educational standards (FSES) themselves should be linked to the National Qualifications Framework (NQF), which, in turn, should generally comply with the International Standard Classification of Occupations (ISCO) and the International Standards for Educational Qualifications (ISCED), created under the auspices of the UN. And if there is still no such interface, then it must be urgently established and approved at the government level.

To be more specific, the criteria (descriptors) previously developed by the Ministry of Labor for the National Qualifications System could serve as the basis for determining the terms of study for basic (fundamental) and specialized higher education. Among them: 1) the level of complexity of the activity, 2) the level of science intensity and 3) the level of responsibility. This means that the terms of study for the main professional educational program of higher education are determined according to the level of complexity of the graduate's professional activity, the level of knowledge-intensivity of this professional activity and the level of independence and responsibility implicit in the qualification of the graduate as a result of such a program, as well as how many qualifications can be obtained within the framework of the program. Let's say an operating engineer is a specialist whose professional activity is not too complicated and science-intensive, and in terms of responsibility he or she is just a "performer". Then, in aggregate, all this can correspond to the 6th level of the National Qualification Framework and the four-year term of study at the university at the first basic stage. If such an indicator as “responsibility” begins to increase in professional activity, then the training period is five years. If, in addition to this, science intensity is also growing, then the training period is six years. Accordingly, the level of qualification as a whole also grows.

Now let's talk about the connection between higher and secondary schools, which in many respects has noticeably weakened, as well as the connection between higher education and the labor market. For example, it is no secret to anyone that every year the training of school graduates is getting worse and worse due to various objective and subjective reasons, especially in physics and mathematics. As a result, over the past few years, the number of schoolchildren choosing the state exam in physics has been declining steadily. We observe this negative trend in Tomsk and the Tomsk region. But even those who are able to pass physics at school often experience great difficulties when they enter university. To overcome first-year students' gap in physics and mathematics, universities are often forced to give a condensed version of the necessary knowledge that should have been obtained at high school.

But there are also deeper gaps between what there is and what there should be. In particular, between the regurgitative thinking of high school students, which dominates as a result of a long preparation for the unified state exam tests, and the productive or creative thinking, which is in demand at university. Accustomed to solving problems “according to patterns” and certain logical schemes, young people are unable to go beyond stereotypes and independently find new ways to solve problems, establish new connections between certain phenomena. The formation of truly complex thinking in students, which is necessary for every true researcher, on such a basis becomes almost impossible!

- What should we do then? Is there a way out of this problematic situation?

- We believe that a closer connection between the university and the school can be provided by various mechanisms. Today, our university, along with the schools of the region, is participating in the joint organization of early vocational guidance for school children, aimed at increasing the number of graduates who take the exam in physics and mathematics. We are starting to engage in periodic professional development of teachers of natural sciences and mathematical disciplines at TSU's scientific centers and laboratories. As for the unified state exam, it needs to be urgently improved by supplementing them with creative tasks of various types. All these issues, of course, require joint discussion by university and school professional communities, as well as joint adoption of relevant decisions by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education and the Ministry of Education. In general, if you try to improve only one system of higher education in isolation from related areas, it will be “disconnected” from both the school and the labor market.

– What else, in your opinion, needs to be done right now to make the formation of a new national system of higher education more successful?

-              We need to be ready for an experiment. We understand that the contour of the future national system of higher education should take shape in real field conditions. We can design indefinitely. But only when we understand what the real needs of employers are and what should be the content of specific programs of basic higher education, master's and postgraduate studies, will we be able to come up with something concrete and adapted for life. It is only in experiment that it is possible to put all this together. Therefore, we, as a classical university, must be prepared to conduct such broad experiments with both the basic part of higher education (4-5-6 years), and its specialized part (1-5 years), and additional vocational education (from 1 year).

– At first glance, it seems that the new Russian system of higher education will be much more complicated than it was before. This refers to different terms, programs and formats of training at the first basic and second specialized levels of higher education.

- It cannot be simple by definition. Everyone is already accustomed to the fact that we live in a complex, digital network information society. We live in difficult times of economic and other sanctions from states unfriendly to Russia. We live in a difficult period of simultaneous reform of many spheres of life of the Russian society, but for some reason many people think that the new system of higher education should be simple! The main thing that it should do is to ensure the national interests of our country, the strategy of its technological leadership and rapid progressive development, as well as the rights of our citizens to receive such higher education that would best suit their abilities, opportunities and life plans. And these plans, as we know, change quite often. Therefore, higher education should be not only of high quality, but also flexible. Hence the variety of terms and formats. It is indisputable, however, that all changes and innovations in the system of higher education must be accompanied by constant explanatory work on the part of those who carry out these innovations, including the universities themselves. Appropriate broad information campaigns in the media should be carried out. It may be necessary to develop an accessible and understandable catalog of educational areas, formats and terms of study, as well as the qualifications awarded, in which all state universities would be represented.

- How would you like to end this “conversation about the complex issues”?

- Any large-scale state reform is, on the one hand, "regulatory", and on the other, a lot of work to form a public consensus. It is important to ascertain as much as possible the expectations of all social groups that will be affected in one way or another by the reform. In our case, these are employers, partners, potential applicants, their parents, and professors. It is necessary to take into account their stereotypes, fears, and hopes in order to understand the moods and motivations of all the participants. When designing a new system of higher education, it is necessary to form clearer ideas about the goals, means and possible consequences of this process. Today many people understand that a “window of opportunity” has opened for all of us. But it may close if we do not have our own opinions and proposals. If today we do not show the initiatives that the Ministry expects from us, then the “regulatory” officials will be forced to offer some version of their own. The sooner we start to attempt solutions and to look for answers to solve existing problems together with employers, applicants and parents, the more likely it is that an effective and harmonious system will develop. Yes, President Putin determined the process would be gradual, but the day-to-day routine is overwhelming, so it is also impossible for us to slow down.

TSU Rector Eduard Gakazhinskiy

The conversation was transcribed by Irina Kuzheleva-Sagan

Translated by Snezhana Nosova