According to the Minister of Science and Higher Education, this will allow to accelerate the implementation of the pilot project to improve the system of personnel training, which was initiated by Vladimir Putin.
On Tuesday, December 26, Valery Falkov, Minister of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, paid a working visit to Empress Catherine II Saint Petersburg Mining University. He emphasized that the first higher technical educational institution of Russia, within the walls of which it is located, has become the only higher education institution in the country that has completely switched to the new system of personnel training.
Rector Vladimir Litvinenko said that almost all first-year students who enrolled in bachelor's degree programs this year took advantage of the offer to transfer to 5.5-year specialty programs. This will allow them to obtain deeper fundamental knowledge, additional competencies in digital technologies, economics, management, and most importantly - to increase the period of industrial practice to a total of 10 months. All these changes are aimed at increasing their competitiveness and reducing their adaptation time in the real economy after graduation from their alma mater.
"We have already fundamentally changed the system of higher education, created its unified structure, which will meet the needs of business and contribute to solving the most important state tasks. Among them is the restoration of generational continuity in industry, partly lost today. I can say unequivocally: we are supported by employers, representatives of the academic community, and students themselves, who, having abandoned the bachelor's degree en masse, have approved the changes that have taken place at our university, not in words, but in deeds," emphasized Vladimir Litvinenko.
The Minister noted the relevance and timeliness of the idea of President Vladimir Putin, who initiated a pilot project to improve the system of personnel training for various sectors of our country's economy. It consists in abandoning the bachelor's degree and switching to basic higher technical education, which will allow to return the best practices of the Soviet era and not to lose the achievements of recent years.
"This solution, the implementation of which has already started today at St. Petersburg Mining University, is designed to provide an interdisciplinary, practice-oriented approach to training. In my opinion, we need to spread your experience to other universities as soon as possible, to implement your model in at least half a dozen universities in the very near future. It is important not only to accelerate the implementation of the pilot project, but also for the growth of academic mobility," Valery Falkov addressed Vladimir Litvinenko.
At the end of the meeting, the Rector spoke about the new concept of postgraduate training, also implemented at the Mining University. He noted that 90% of all universities in the world consider postgraduate studies solely as a launching pad for a scientist's career. However, this approach is not perfect, because it is equally important to create a viable system of training teachers of the highest category, i.e. "staff who train staff".
Vladimir Litvinenko expressed confidence that the changes in the curricula of St. Petersburg university allowed to find a balance between pedagogical and scientific competencies of young people, to create conditions for their professional growth and moral education.
