The RF government has initiated a Bill calling for the introduction of compulsory general education. If the State Duma approves it, the school age could be extended to 20.
Lawmakers argue that without compulsory "third stage" education, people are denied their right to a full education. Today, students may be denied entry into high school, yet it is "difficult to get ahead after just nine grades of education." They also argue that a lack of education has "negative socio-economic consequences," specifically "limiting vocational guidance and employment opportunities" and creating "shortages in the labor market."
Objections
There are three main objections to the Bill. First, it is impossible to translate it into reality without amending the Constitution. Second, there are no credible guarantees that compulsory secondary education will be really free. Finally, who really needs "education through coercion?"
"Assistance should only be provided to people who really want to acquire a secondary education, or a higher education for that matter," Oleg Denisov, deputy chairman of the State Duma Science and Education Committee, told this reporter. "We should be moving away from the principle of compulsory education, not introducing it. But in this particular case, responsibilities should be clearly defined and effective coordination ensured, or the project will be open to abuse and corruption."
According to the deputy, the project is unviable since its implementation requires a review of the RF Constitution, specifically Article 43, which states: "Everyone shall have the right to education. Everyone shall have the right to receive, free of charge and on a competitive basis, higher education in a state or municipal educational institution or enterprise. Basic general education shall be mandatory. The Russian Federation shall institute federal state educational standards and support various forms of education and self-education."
Russia's law "guarantees the accessibility and gratuity of pre-school, general secondary and vocational secondary education in public and municipal educational institutions and enterprises," Denisov said. "But the bill proposes replacing the concept of ‘basic' in the RF Law on Education with ‘compulsory.' Therefore, unless corresponding amendments are also made in the Constitution, there will be no guarantee that education will remain free."
There is yet another disturbing factor. An explanatory note to the Bill says that its implementation will not require additional budget spending. But someone has to pay for the changes that will be made. If the state initiates "compulsory general education," it should also pay for it.
"The RF Education Ministry is already planning to reduce the amount of compulsory classroom hours in senior grades by introducing fee-charging electives," Denisov continued. "For example, if students have 45 mandatory classroom hours today, the number could drop to 15, with every other being optional. This is, in effect, a first step toward the introduction of fee paying tuition schemes. This will not only lead to a decline in education standards but also a change in tuition priorities. Education will turn into a service sector: a person will only be able to study if s/he can pay for it."
Myths and Reality
The problem of fighting illiteracy in Europe arose in the Middle Ages, when the Bible was translated into all European languages. Pastors were explaining to their ignorant flock that God created man in His own image and likeness and therefore man must constantly work to live up to that image - which required, at the very least, an ability to read the Holy Writ. That problem was solved in the 17th century by Jan Amos Komensky (Comenius), a great Czech thinker, philosopher and writer, best known as a pioneer of education, who devised the classroom system. Four centuries have passed, but the Russian "classroom" system remains largely unchanged.
In the 1960s, Europe and the U.S. were shaken by a series of student revolutions, provoked by a crisis in the public education system. Among the revolutionary slogans were: "Down with Dull and Boring Professors!" and "Power to the Imagination!" The system has changed drastically since then. Schools and universities introduced tentative education schemes - a diversity of courses for a student to choose from according to needs and tastes. Another innovation was "problem specific" education with students entering narrow fields, such as Fighting Cancer, Fighting Smoking, etc. It seemed like a classical education was on its way out the door.
After his trip to the U.S., Nikita Khrushchev, taken aback by what he had seen there, gave Soviet scholars and academics three months to make the country's education system the best in the world.
Three months later, the general secretary was duly advised that the Soviet education system was already the best because the Soviet Union had won World War II. That was how Soviet education reform ended before it even started, and how the myth about the best education system in the world was born. The most convincing arguments to that effect were the first Sputnik and the first man in space: all those breakthroughs and discoveries were made in defiance of "the world's best education system," not because of it. Another myth is that there is an almost insatiable demand for Russian scientists in the West. This seems to be the exception rather than the rule. Some argue that Russians primarily do routine, run-of-the-mill work.
School Crisis
The Bill has raised eyebrows within the expert community, many of whom believe that compulsory education will not increase knowledge. Rather, it will turn school into an institution for overage teenagers absolutely unprepared for independent life.
"What is Russia's secondary school today? An institution that performs a few social, non-educational functions," Sergei Popov, president of the International Methodological Association and director of the Public Education Expertise project, told this reporter. "It's an institution where children from seven to 17 slowly develop under strict supervision. Rather than acquire real knowledge, students are forced to learn by rote, memorizing in a mechanical way a flow of information that they will never use in reality. They know, for instance, the distance between Earth and the Sun, they can say what quantum physics is, but they do not know the first thing about their rights and duties, or how to use legal or banking services, or how to behave in an emergency, or acquire information that they may really need in their life. Outside the school and family, without their teachers and parents, they are helpless. If children are forced to study until the age of 20, while the really bright ones who really want to study are stuck within a two-tier education system, they will never become real professionals. As for the diploma, it will be worth little more than the paper on which it is printed."
According to Popov, innovative advanced schools in Moscow and across Russia abandoned the Education Ministry's top-heavy, convoluted, drawn-out curriculum a long time ago. Practice shows that with advanced technology, a year-long course can be covered within just two months. Children spend the rest of the time at camps under student exchange programs, study languages, go on study trips and excursions, practice sports, engage in community work, etc.
"Being a teacher myself, I know what our ‘professional educators' are like," he continued. "The only thing that the majority of them can do is spoon feed a limited amount of knowledge that they have acquired over the years. Their worldview is limited and distorted by their specific discipline, school curriculum and grading system. They are a bunch of fogy schoolmarms unable to spot a real talent or look for innovation. Nothing will change, even if they were showered with money."
Indeed, statistics show that people who have achieved something in business, science, art or politics, received their education elsewhere than at schools or universities. One can only learn business through practice; cutting-edge scientists have learned from real researchers, inventors and innovators, while real artists are not trained in an academy of arts.
Needless to say, the Russian government drew up this Bill with the best of intentions - "to provide conditions ensuring a dignified life and free development for each and every person." And it must be quite sincere in thinking that "compulsory general education, at all stages, responds to the interests of both the citizens and the state as a whole." Yet it ignored the fact that 30 percent of these citizens, aged 18 to 20, already have their own families and children to look after. They have other things to worry about than going to school. Money spent on "education through coercion" is money wasted.
As far as education reform as such is concerned, there have been plenty of proposals and ideas for reviving this sector during the past year, since the national education priority program was announced - teachers' wages, classroom hours, the structure of the curriculum, and so on. But nothing has been said about education as one of the fundamental institutions of society. In a fast-changing world, with technologies changing almost every day, the education system should learn to teach these technologies, and do it quickly, not years from now.
Analysts are pessimistic. In 15 to 20 years, all managerial positions [in Russia] will be filled by Western specialists because Russian "specialists" are 100 years behind. The bulk of our general workforce will come from Asia, while Russians will be strangers in their own country.
Is this the kind of an education system that we need?
By Yekaterina Rozhayeva
