POLITICAL AND LEGAL FRAMEWORK AND PROBLEMS OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF ETHNOCULTURAL COMPONENT IN THE ACTIVITIES OF REGIONAL UNIVERSITIES OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION

Статья посвящена исследованию степени соответствия современной политики российского государства в сфере образования, процессов, происходящих в региональных университетах, политико-правовым основам многонациональной Российской Федерации, заложенным в Конституции, других важнейших документах, определяющих принципы её государственно-территориального устройства. Эти основы официально гарантируют российским народам и регионам всестороннее социокультурное, образовательное, научно-технологическое развитие. Целью работы является всесторонний анализ просчётов деятельности российского государства в образовательной сфере в постсоветский период, приведших к проблемам, не позволяющим региональным университетам сегодня решать возлагаемые на них обществом функции, а также поиск путей их решения. Процесс реализации данной цели определил следующие задачи: проанализировать степень соответствия постсоветской политики российского государства в образовательной сфере провозглашённым политико-правовым основам государственного устройства РФ, гарантиям социокультурного развития российских народов; выявить взаимосвязь результатов современных реформ в системе высшего образования с объективными функциями региональных университетов РФ; раскрыть позитивный потенциал региональных университетов в решении социально-экономических, социокультурных проблем регионов и народов РФ, сохранении и укреплении её евразийской цивилизационной сущности; исследовать негативные последствия постсоветских реформ, отразившихся на состояние дел в региональных университетах, наметить пути решения возникающих проблем; показать важность учёта этнокультурного компонента в системе образования многонациональной РФ, определяющего личностные и профессиональные качества подрастающих поколений, способствующего достижению межнационального согласия и стабильности в российском обществе. The paper is devoted to the study of the degree of compliance of the modern policy of the Russian state in the field of education, the processes taking place in regional universities with the political and legal foundations of the multinational Russian Federation, laid down in the Constitution, and other important documents that determine the principles of its state-territorial structure. These foundations officially guarantee the Russian peoples and regions comprehensive socio-cultural, educational, scientific and technological development. The purpose of the work is a comprehensive analysis of the miscalculations of the activities of the Russian state in the educational sphere in the post-Soviet period, which led to problems that do not allow regional universities today to solve the functions assigned to them by society, as well as the search for ways to solve them. The process of implementing this goal defined the following tasks: to analyze the degree of compliance of the post-Soviet policy of the Russian state in the educational sphere with the proclaimed political and legal foundations of the state structure of the Russian Federation, guarantees of the socio-cultural development of Russian peoples; to identify the relationship of the results of modern reforms in the higher education system with the objective functions of regional universities of the Russian Federation; to unleash the positive potential of regional universities in solving the socio-economic, sociocultural problems of the regions and peoples of the Russian Federation, preserving and strengthening its Eurasian civilizational essence; investigate the negative consequences of post-Soviet reforms on the state of affairs in regional universities, outline ways to solve emerging problems; show the importance of taking into account the ethnocultural component in the education system of the multinational Russian Federation, which determines the personal and professional qualities of younger generations, which contributes to the achievement of interethnic harmony and stability in Russian society.

Professional self-determination of school graduates: social and personal factors

Given the negative demographic trends and the aging of labor resources in most regions of Russia, it is important to curb educational migration away from them. The study of the mechanisms of professional self-determination of schoolchildren goes beyond pedagogical tasks in the field of public administration and regional economy. Psychological mechanisms of career choice and educational strategy building were widely studied during the twentieth century, but the question of the influence of social conditions in a particular region on the professional self-determination of young people remains poorly understood. Solving the problems of professional self-determination of schoolchildren requires the synthesis of personality-oriented and socially-oriented pedagogical approaches. The article examines the factors that determine the professional self-determination of school graduates and analyzes the conditions and patterns of schoolchildren’s professional self�determination, together with the potential of their influence on educational strategy by regional universities. The research hypothesis is that, when providing pedagogical support for professional self-determination of pupils, it is necessary to take into account both their personal characteristics and individual motives, as well as socio-economic factors that determine the choice of educational strategy. The research used comparative analysis, classification, generalization, an inter-disciplinary review of literature and socio-economic statistics, a sociological survey, and expert assessments. The main results are the description of models of professional self-determination of school graduate based on their awareness, values, self-efficacy assessment, and the justification of the principles of career guidance. A survey of school graduates in the Ulyanovsk region in 2018-2019 (n=2075) showed that a significant number of graduates lacked professional plans and knowledge about regional universities and universities in other cities. The study revealed the professional interests of school graduates and their plans for educational migration from the region. School graduates did not justify their choice of a career and educational strategies by their professional interests, but rather on their desired standard of living upon graduation. It established that the quality of education at the university is not a determining factor for potential applicants. As actors in the regional educational space, professional education organizations can have a greater impact on the processes of professional self-determination of high school students. The results indicate the importance of regional socio-economic conditions for professional self�determination of school graduates, their educational strategy and choice of university. The study confirmed that their professional self-determination follows the principles of the Social Cognitive Career Theory.

VOLGSTU GRADUATE ASSOCIATION: DEBUT IN A PANDEMIC BACKGROUND

Alumni associations are a relatively new phenomenon for Russia, typical, as a rule, for large metropolitan universities with a long history, rich traditions and extensive international relations. In recent years, alumni associations have begun to appear in regional universities. The authors analyze the situation with the development of alumni associations in the flagship universities of the country and in the universities of Volgograd (the chronology and forms of activity are considered). The article summarizes the results of Volgograd State Technical University Alumni Association's first year. Plans, goals and tasks for the further development of the VolgSTU Alumni Association have been developed. The authors show that the dynamic formation of alumni associations can be promising for regional universities as well, serving as platforms for the interaction of regional elites, centres of strategic decisions for regional development and providing communication between generations of alumni.

Is the infrastructure of regional universities ready to meet the challenges of digital transformation?

The processes of informatization, digitalization, and digital transformation of education have led to large-scale changes that have affected almost all elements of the educational system – from pedagogical concepts and technologies to the structures of new types («digital universities», «smart campuses», etc.). The creation of such structures is based on the universities’ IT-infrastructure, the requirements for the latter to be determined by the modern problems challenging the higher education system. The development of the IT-infrastructure became particularly important during the COVID-19 pandemic, when there appeared the necessity of an urgent transition to electronic forms of education, including the mass delivery of electronic content to students. This problem was most acute for regional universities, whose own resources were not always sufficient to solve it. The purpose of this research article is to analyze the dynamics of the universities’ IT-infrastructure 2015–2020 development in the Sverdlovsk region as the basis for their digitalization and digital transformation. The choice of the Sverdlovsk region is explained by the fact that among the subjects of the Russian Federation, it occupies one of the leading positions by the number of universities and the number of students. Within the study, based on 2015–2020 statistical data (the so-called «ВПО-1» and «ВПО-2» forms as filled in by all HEIs), there were analyzed various components of the universities’ IT-infrastructure: the park of personal computers and multimedia facilities; the access to the Internet; the general availability of special software both for the region as a whole and in the context of particular universities. According to our analysis, the period studied saw growth in the information equipment provision for the universities’ non-educational activities, and – at the same time – decrease in the provision of computers used for educational purposes and for the students’ independent work. Along with the positive dynamics of providing the universities with access to high-speed Internet, less than a third of them maintain a maximum speed of over 100 Mbps. The universities are provided mainly with mandatory software tools (electronic library and reference systems, testing systems), whereas the virtual simulators are the least available. Another problem is the obsolescence of universities’ information technology equipment. At the same time, the region continues to see the universities’ differentiation by the level of all the IT-infrastructure components development (hardware, Internet access, software). To solve the problems of digitalization and digital transformation, the universities should assess the IT-infrastructure capacity necessary to solve modern educational and extracurricular tasks according to the interests of external and internal stakeholders (including employees and students of various categories), and more clearly formulate the objectives of modernizing IT-infrastructure in their development programs (strategies). The elimination of the universities’ digital inequality in the regions should be reflected in federal projects concerning the development of higher education. For these purposes, it is necessary to develop a modern methodology for assessing the compliance of the universities’ IT-infrastructure with the requirements of digitalization and digital transformation. Our research is original, as it presents an attempt to analyze the dynamics of the universities’ IT-infrastructure development in the Sverdlovsk region on the basis of statistical data.

The student youth’s universal values and the Russian society development

In recent decades, the concept of sustainable development has become the key theoretical focus for most countries. Traditions and values play an important role in ensuring sustainable development, including the attitudes of the younger generation, especially of the student youth who plan their professional future in Russia or abroad. The student youth preferences largely determine the country's development strategy and the assessment of its human capital. In 2018, the authors conducted the second wave of the empirical study Spiritual-moral culture of the Russian university (first wave - in 2012) which focused on the values of students of such leading universities as the Lomonosov Moscow State University and Saint Petersburg State University, and of such regional universities as the Tyumen State University, Samara State Technical University and Sevastopol State University. The research was conducted by a mass survey of 2505 students, including an online questionnaire. The concept of traditionalist modernization was used as an explanatory model. The article presents the results of the factor analysis of students value orientations according to the Schwartz scale and of students leisure practices, and also such indicators as authority, responsibility and tolerance of students. The authors come to the conclusion about the youths universal values that are quite flexible in relation to both modernization and preservation of the Russian specifics, which is somewhat different from the 2012 study with a more evident commitment to traditionalism. The authors interpret this fact as a generational feature of people born in the prosperous 2000s, which proves the gradual transition of the Russian society to the universal values, a combination of different value foundations and a departure from paternalistic attitudes. The article presents the results of the comparative analysis of some priorities of metropolitan and regional universities students, identifies the specifics of both types of universities, which allows to stress the different degrees of values universalism.

Ways to Success in Education: Students’ Behavioral Strategies in Regional Universities of Russia

The article discusses the behavioral strategies of students of regional Russian universities, focused on achieving educational success. The situation of uncertainty in modern higher education is shown as a social context that determines the variability of students’ behavioral strategies. A factor that has a significant impact on the phenomenon under study is the change in the views of the main educational communities (teachers and students) about educational success: the expansion of the range of its components, differentiation among different groups of students, orientation to non-educational benefits and values that can be obtained by university graduates in the future at the expense of educational capital. Based on the data of an empirical study conducted in the universities of the Sverdlovsk region in 2019-2021, the characteristic of behavioral strategies for achieving educational success implemented by students of Ural universities is given. It is noted that strategies for achieving success in education begin to be formed in the pre-university period, as part of the transition from school to university. It is concluded that during the university period, in response to new goals and learning difficulties, different groups of students develop four types of behavioral strategies – traditional, innovative, imitation, and «withdrawal» strategies.

Womens’ Career Progression in an Australian Regional University

This article examines the link between terms of employment (full time, part time and casual) at an Australian regional university and women’s career progression. The literature identifies lack of transparency in recruitment, promotion and retention; mobility and location; and management perceptions of women’s choice to work flexibly as factors impacting on career progression. However, the voices of women working in regional universities and particularly those of professional staff are often not present in current research. This study moves towards addressing this research deficit. Feminist institutionalism is used to analyse the relationship between national legislation, university policies and informal institutional practices in relation to women’s career progression In early 2020, twenty-one women provided written responses to questions on the link between terms of employment and career progression. The main findings tend to support other research about women working in universities; that is, carers need flexible work arrangements. But there are particular differences for women in regional universities who have to travel between dispersed campuses, which brings an added dimension of complexity to career progression. Their choices about terms of employment and fulfilling carer responsibilities resulted in insecure employment for some participants which had an impact on wellbeing and confidence. In addition, care/household responsibilities and the choice to work flexibly had a negative effect on career progression, and managers did not necessarily support flexible work options (despite national legislation that enables employees with child care responsibilities to negotiate flexible work arrangements with managers, and institutional gender equality policies).

Technological Entrepreneurship in Regional Universities of Russia: Factors of Containment and Acceleration

The role of universities in modern socio-economic systems of states is undergoing significant changes and involves the actualization of approaches to defining the functions of educational organizations. At the same time, university startups are viewed as the most dynamic elements of regional economies, capable of creating export-oriented science-intensive products and new high-tech jobs. Transformation and development of regional entrepreneurial ecosystems using as a trigger for academic entrepreneurship of universities to stimulate the powers of the subjects of the federation of the process of formation of start-ups by universities in cooperation with local or global enterprises of the real sector of the economy.The study aimed to analyze the factors that stimulate and hinder technological entrepreneurship in regional universities in Russia. A review of the approaches used in the world’s leading universities, creating successful entrepreneurial ecosystems, is carried out, the key factors that determine the productivity of such ecosystems are highlighted. It is noted that in most constituent entities of the Russian Federation, it is not possible to implement a set of basic factors that contribute to the involvement of RIA in the regional economy, including in local universities, as well as in horizontal network interaction of startups founded by graduates or employees of regional universities.The functions for the university’s management of the transformation of regional ecosystems in entrepreneurial universities and the formation of university ecosystems are proposed.