Changing Realities: Russian Higher Education and the Academic Profession

Abstract

Three perspectives dominate modern debates about higher education in Russia and the prospects of national universities. Some observers believe that the Russian higher education system is one of the best in the world, referring to the success of Russian specialists internationally. Others say that the former point of view is harmful because the quality of the country’s education is a myth and the universities have undergone fundamentally negative changes during recent decades, which cannot be abolished. Finally, the third group of people prefer to talk about the current challenges the Russian education system faces and the goals that need to be addressed in order to build an effective system of professional education to suit the modern labor market and to produce fundamental research and application studies, based on international standards in the global academic market.