At the forum “Development of higher education”, which was attended by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, Minister of education and science Olga Vassilieva and 450 representatives of the University community were announced two interesting topics: the programme supporting universities and plans for the development of digital education in Russia.
“Supporting universities” is the program of creating strong universities through merging of existing Universities for socio-economic development of regions. This will enable to keep talented students in the regions, to ensure cooperation with local large enterprises, to develop leaders for positive change in the region.
During the discussion, the entrance of Regional chiefs in the Supervisory boards of the supporting universities was proposed. In particular, the Governor of St. Petersburg Georgy Poltavchenko shared with positive experience. The Prime Minister had fully supported the initiative.
As for the development of digital education, Dmitry Medvedev said that the government plans to increase the number of online courses of University education on the national platform for open education up to 500 courses in 2017, in 2018 – up to 1’000 PCs in 2020 – up to 2’000 PCs. The number of students should be about 20’000 people in 2017, 100’000 in 2018 and about 300’000 in 2020.
“Open education” is an educational platform offering free online courses on basic subjects studied in Russian universities. The platform was created by the Association of national platform “open education”, established by the leading universities – Moscow state University, St.-Petersburg University, SPbSU, nust “MISIS”, national research UNIVERSITY “HSE”, MIPT, Urfu and ITMO. Diplomas are recognised in any University of the Russian Federation.
The Prime Minister also noted, “in order to have trust, it is necessary to involve in project well-known, respected teachers. And, of course, in my opinion it is also a match with a nice, respectable, serious institutions of higher education. If such a course will have approvement of Moscow state University, St. Petersburg University or other universities, for me, as a student, it would be a sign of quality.”
Sources: Russian Ministry of Science and Education, The decree of the RF Government dated 23/05/2015 N 497 “About the Federal target education development program for 2016 – 2020 years”, Open Education, Опорные университеты
