About Russian Higher Engineering School and their place in the system of Russian Higher Education I.B.
Fyodorov N.E.Bauman's
MSTU, Russia One
can refer the reformation of economics of industrially developed countries onto
the way of technological development, the dominance of scientific- and
intellectually capacious economics, as well as the formation of social-economic
organization of postindustrial society on such a base to one of the leading
factors of the world development, producing considerable influence on the
development of the system of higher education. Russia meets the twenty first century under the conditions
of serious social and economic collisions. It's also known that countries with
stable economic and social development, solid positions in the world community
and world markets, high level and high-quality life of the population are
characterized by the unprecedented scale of higher education development and
growing realization of its vital role in their well-being and prosperity
ensuring. Thus it's becoming evident that our possibilities as well - of
meeting future in a fitting manner and successful coping with newly arising
problems - will significantly depend on power and direction of the Russian
intellectual potential and finally on the state of native education in general
and higher education in particular. In its turn it leads to the necessity of
elaborating a strategy of the Russian high school transformation, its
adaptation to the present situation, which should result in a highly effective
system of education, capable to fulfill the responsible mission and taking into
consideration the state of the financial situation in our country with the
least expenses. The researches carried out in MGTU named after N.E. Bauman for
the last years, show that one of the expedient ways of this task solution is
the elaboration of the creation of the institution of research universities in
Russia, and in the aspect of engineering-technical education - research
technical universities. For better understanding of this new phenomenon, let's
briefly consider the aims having led to the original appearance of research
universities in the world system of higher professional education and the ways
these aims were transformed in the course of time. The history of their
appearance shows that having been born in the recesses of German Humboldt
University in the second half of the nineteenth century, the research
university passed several stages of its development. At the definite stage
German universities experienced some regress - they lost the unity of academic
and research activity, proclaimed by Humboldt. Scientific investigations were
reorganized out of the university academic structure into the special research
institutes attached to universities. Though university professors continued
active partici-pation in the research work of the institutes, by their
organization research institutes were not rendered as parts of a German
university. The university acquired the status of a purely educational
institution, but not of a university. Scientific activity of teachers acquired
financing by these institutes, not by the university. Thus the unity of
academic and teaching activities of German universities has been lost. The history of the USA
G.Gopkins university development is also exponent. Its first president
D.Guilman, a person of deep knowledge, wide erudition and broad mind, familiar
with the experience of the best universities of Western Europe and Russia (he
lived in Russia for several years as the American Embassy attache), was highly
enthusiastic and proclaimed the importance of fundamental sciences' development
as the base of all the technical progress. Correspondingly, the university of
G.Gopkins was founded exclusively as a scientific centre, where scientists
carried out fundamental researches together with the talented youth, attracted
to the university as students. It was supposed, that within the process of such
scientific research work young scientists would be brought up. Such approach to
the future specialists' training has been entitled as research school. The
absence of regular educational process in Gopkins University led to the loss of
its social significance, having created the reputation of the educational
institution, unable to train highly qualified specialists, in which industry
was in great need of. Thus having been deprived of financial support the founders
had to introduce the college programme into the university as the first step of
higher education for students' training. The programme was meant to provide the
possibility of full-blooded education within the postgraduate research school,
and then to create a high professional school on the basis of the postgraduate
education. The example of G.Gopkins University was followed by
Cornel and Harward universities, which went further
more. Here alongside with fundamental researches much attention was given to
the applied branches of knowledge, as well as to practical specialists'
training. Alongside with research schools there were opened full-blooded high
professional schools, which built their programmes on the basis of education
acquired in college. Besides, unlike G.Gopkins University, college became an
integral part of the university, its base, where alongside with training for
study in research and professional schools one could also get education within
qualification, providing the opportunity of professional activity. Thus by
the experience of Harvard university the contemporary research university of
the USA has been formed, in which the education is composed of two elements:
the first stage - as a four-year college - and the second stage (postgraduate),
represented by research schools, carrying out fundamental research and
scientific staff training, and professional schools, in which applied
researches are carried out and practical specialists are being trained. The
research school graduation provides a Master's degree or, by the corresponding
increase of the education term - the Doctor's degree (PhD) in the corresponding
field of knowledge. Unlike these academic degrees those graduating from
professional schools get various professional degrees (the degree of an
Engineer, Doctor of Medicine, Doctor of Law, etc.). Harvard University, thus, has become the prototype of research
universities. The Harvard's way was followed by the elite USA universities, and
in the course of time the universities of many other countries - Japan, Sweden,
the Netherlands, China and others. The establishment of research universities
in these countries had primary significance for them, providing the
transmission to the training of highly qualified specialists by research and professional
schools. The interest of industrial companies to research universities was not
limited to the need in the new quality qualified staff. The peculiar interest
to research universities was demonstrated by the companies, specializing in
research and development. The expansion of research universities' functions led
to further modification of the educational process technology - step-by-step
research schools started to approach professional schools. One of the most vivid examples of a contemporary research
university is Massachusetts Technological University. Currently MTI - is one of the best world universities.
Educational and research activity, which is based on the principle of bond to
real problems, remains its main task. The inclination of MTI to the combination of
educational activity with the new knowledge acquisition creates favorable
conditions for research work. Namely these conditions breed up a number of
considerable scientific discoveries and technical achievements, born within the
walls of MTI. Among previous achievements there is development of contemporary
technology of food products preservation, penicillin and vitamin A first
chemical synthesis, inertial navigation system elaboration, modern technologies
of prosthetic appliances' manufacturing, high-speed photography, the memory
settlement on magnetic cores, providing the possibility of electronic
calculation means' development. MTI - is one of the leading USA research universities.
The research recently carried out has shown that annual economic effect of
inventions and new technologies, worked out in the university, comprises 20
billion dollars and 150000 new work places. MTI is a constant leader
among the American universities according to the patents' quantity and annually
concludes about 70 agreements on the author's rights with private companies.
It's much to the point to say that one of the most important criterions of a
research university is high authority and wide public recognition. The number of research universities is rather limited.
There is some maximal amount of research universities, which the country can
afford. For instance, in the USA out of 3300 higher education institutions only
104 or 3.1% are considered to be elite. They comprise more than 80% of federal
assignments for scientific investigations, carried out in the institutions of
higher education and the majority of the conferred Doctor's degrees. A considerable role in research universities'
formation belongs to the state. It takes the greater part of costs both of the
development of the corresponding fundamental research and of the financing of
the expensive programs of scientific and professional highly qualified staff
training. The analysis of the policy of the USA federal government for the last
three decades evidently demonstrates that practically all its activity was
primarily aimed at the search for the solution of one task concerning the
creation and development of the group of first-rate research universities,
where the best scientific forces and mostly talented youth were concentrated
for the provision of the national economics with all the necessary researches
and scientific-technical staff. There is one more significant aspect of the problem of
global higher education development, arising peculiar attention to the idea of
research universities' creation. The point is that for the last two decades
there emerged a tendency to mass character, and in Canada to the universal
higher education as well. It's clear, that in this situation it would become as
well typical of Russia in future, and it's necessary to point out the
educational institutions, which would train elite specialists, highly-qualified
professionals, defining the progress of the world science and engineering.
Obviously, research universities will become such educational institutions. It would be reasonable to set one more
example, referring to MTI. In the research recently carried out by Bank-Boston
it is stated, that if 4000 companies or of a number, founded by the MTI
graduates, were united into the independent state, it would gain the
24-th place in the world judging by the level of incomes. More than 1
million people work in these companies, and their annual income
comprises 230 billion of dollars. Half of them was founded by the
MTI graduates within 15 years after the graduation, and 1/6 - in the course of
5 years. The majority of companies may be referred to small business
associations, however 17 count for more than 10000 employees. Let's consider the problem of research universities in
Russia. Complex political and social-economic processes, taking place in our
country and connected with the transfer to the market economy, with the
structural transformation of production, the development of regional economics,
as well as with the Russian defense complex conversion and integration of the
national economics into the global economic community bring some uniqueness
into these problems' solution. And namely today there comes a question of
goal-oriented support of the leading Russian universities, able to contribute
to the development of the Russian economics, to the increase of its competitive
ability. Within the frames of new economics the university role
considerably increases. Now it's not only a national scientific-research
laboratory, but also a mechanism, providing the growth of "the country
human capital" - the most important factor for the global competitive
ability preservation. It's a very important aspect for Russia. Because namely
by such signs as "the level of science and technology development"
and "human recourses" Russia still has got the indications comparable
with those of the leading countries of the world. And definitely research
universities possess the possibility of these factors preservation and
development. And further we present a brief sketch of high
technical schools' development in Russia. Its traditions have been formed for
more that two centuries. At the end of the XVIII - at the beginning of the XIX
centuries the engineers' training in Russian technical higher educational
institutions was based on the combination of high theoretical level of teaching
and considerable practical training, while at the same time higher technical
education in Germany and the USA was of craft-practical character. In Russia
high technical schools developed in close connection with natural university
departments, which increased the theoretical level of teaching, led to the
refusal from the narrow-practical approach to engineers' training, contributed
to the training of encyclopedically-educated specialists. The most important
tradition of the Russian high technical school - is organic introduction of the
system of industrial practices, educational workshops, and
laboratory-experimental base into the educational process. The specialists from Great Britain, the USA, and
Germany have acknowledged the priority of the Russian technical school at these
points. The principles, elaborated in Russia, engineers' training ideas and
techniques formed the basis of engineering education abroad. After the presentation
in 1876 at the International Industrial Exhibition in Philadelphia of "the
Russian teaching method", worked out in the Imperial Moscow Technical
College, the USA created a common theory of polytechnic education with the
accent on close connection of science and production. In this connection it's reasonable to
quote the words of one of the first presidents of Massachusetts Technological
Institute of John Rancle: "The method has not only purely
educational significance, but it also carries the only correct, philosophical
approach to all technical education." By the 90-ies Russia had acquired prerequisites for
the consideration of the question of research universities' institution
creation. These prerequisites were defined both by new tasks, set in front of
the high school, and potential of the leading Russian universities, generally
corresponding to the notions and criteria of
a research university. For the last decade more attention has been given to the
development of university education and elite staff training on the basis of
the investigations in priority applied directions and fundamental work. Thus,
in 1996 the initiative group of university presidents at the Board of the
Russian Ministry of Education raised a question concerning the elaboration and
realization of the program "Federal Research University>. In the course of
this suggestion discussion there were defined several approaches to the
creation of federal research universities in Russia. Later this
idea was developed within the development of the federal goal-orientated
program "State support of higher education and fundamental science
integration for 1997-2000". According to one of the projects of this
programme it was decided to form a prototype of the Russian research university
on the base of MGTU named after N.E.Bauman. In the researches, fulfilled in
accordance with the project at the stage of 1977, the necessity of creation
within the system of higher education in Russia the network of research
technical universities combined with mandatory preservation of traditional
institutes of higher education, providing the training of
specialists-professionals of mass educational level, was proved. Thus the
notion of the so-called base higher education (aimed at preparation to the
post-graduate education) must refer only to high level universities, able at
the expense of educational plans' individualization to provide possibilities
for the students, who do not intend to get the following degrees, to obtain the
profession of a comprehensive specialist with the higher professional education
of the first level. As for the traditional educational institutions the state
educational standards should provide the continuity and succession of
education, supplying a profession as well as the possibility to continue
education in research universities depending on their capabilities and hard
work, but not on social status and accommodation. Creating in Russia the institution of research
technical universities, we should not repeat the definite mistakes, which were
made by several countries on this way.š
Russia should be cautious of the peculiar danger of transformation of
higher professional education into academic at the first stage. This has
already started to show up in Russia due to borrowing Western achievements
without sufficient analysis. Actually, in a number of prestigious Western
research universities post-graduate stage has become dominating, and in this
connection the above-mentioned universities have rebuilt the work of the first
stage, having transformed it exclusively into the preliminary base for the
education continuation. A bachelor started to get a degree without acquiring
professional knowledge. It was beneficial for the universities under
consideration, because the amount of their postgraduates exceeded the number of bachelors. However it led to social
inequality of educational opportunities of the population - as it turned out,
the youth, graduating from professional institutes of higher education, gets
education which is inadequate for the education continuation at the last stage
of research universities not depending on their capabilities and talents.
Taking this challenge, ordinary colleges in pursuit of the contingent claimed
of training bachelors-graduates not for the bulk of professions, but
exclusively for the education continuation. There appeared a number of social
complications, up to mass students' disturbances, in connection with the
employment and alongside the total costs on higher education increased
considerably in connection with the abundance of programmers. Much time and
energy has been spent on these consequences' eliminating. While elaborating the
new generation of state educational standards for the Russian bachelors we
should keep away from repeating this experience, relying on article 14 of the
Law of Education of the Russian Federation, according to which higher education
of any level must provide students with the profession and corresponding
qualification. What will be the structure of the Russian high school
after its gradual regulation according to modern requirements? It should
demonstrate to the full and develop the potential of the talented youth of the
country. That's why the development of high school should follow the way of
broad diversification of educational institutions and education integration
based on the principles of transformation of high school into the unified
multistage system headed by research universities. The training of first-rate
post-graduate specialists is concentrated in research universities. The most
talented graduates of mass institutions of higher education should have access
to high-quality education, realizing the opportunity of the education
continuation at higher stages in research universities. Such opportunities are
possible on condition that there will be the succession of educational
programmes at educational institutions of different levels. But this single
condition is not enough. The academic structure of research universities should
also possess the corresponding educational department such as a one-year
specialized college, providing the training of promising graduates of the first
stage from other institutions of higher education for the continuation of
education at the stage of investigation. In the
process of the "Integration" programme realization the concept of the
Russian technical research university has been elaborated. While working at the
concept it has been shown that the problem of further development of the higher
education system cannot be solved without the creation in the country the
institute of research universities, the integration within the frames of
research universities of fundamental science and education. The conditions of preservation of the single education
system in Russia, the problems of postsecondary education diversification and
social equality of the educational opportunities for the youth have been
studied. In the course of this analysis there has been worked out a modern
approach to the creation of a new generation of state educational standards, characterized
by a high quality of different level education succession, providing the
opportunity of the Russian higher education modification into a single
multistage system. While this it's necessary to take into account that a technical research
university is characterized by the training of the specialists both at the base
and, obligatory, at the research stage of education in all the basic
engineering directions and in several humanities, social-economic and
natural-scientific directions. It's desirable that all the university departments,
including general education, general professional, as well as those of the
humanities, will be the departments training specialists of a research stage of
education. For this goal realization each department should have scientific
research laboratories and scientific-research staff, as well as the whole range
of postgraduate level lecture courses in all directions of research stage
preparation. It's necessary that the amount of post-graduate specialists constituted
a considerable share of the number of base stage graduates, nevertheless, the
practice ofš "alien students"
admission to the research stage should be widespread in order to provide the
systematic character of the educational structure in Russia. To satisfy the aim
of scientific knowledge succession in a research university the post-doctor's
degree of education is presupposed, i.e. the sufficient number of vacancies at
the departments, provided for the talented graduates, who got the Doctor's
degree (PhD) or the degree of the candidate of sciences, for
scientific-pedagogical internship and further development of their future
investigations. The university presupposes the international education
center, wide international links, including mutual elaboration of scientific
investigations and projects with foreign universities and firms, including
those in the field of education. In the aspect of the elaboration of new educational
technology, typical of a research technical university, the university staff,
and particularly, the staff of the pilot departments, should have multilateral
tasks which are solved by stages. In particular, several department research
laboratories were created, they provide work places for comprehensive
scientific investigations in the post-graduate educational process. The
university library informatization is widely carried out, a number of mutual
scientific-educational centers together with the Russian Academy of Sciences
were created. A very important question is connected with the choice
of youth for the admission to the research university at the first course and
at the education continuation at the post-graduate level. The main conditions,
which should be satisfied by the applicant to a research technical university,
have been formulated and they include not only general requirements for the
level of knowledge, but also the requirements, presupposing social,
psychological and intellectual maturity of a future student and the
corresponding selection principles have also been worked out. On the bases of
investigations and corresponding testing it's possible to say that the
developed system of pre-university preparation in a research technical
university allows to increase considerably the level of students' preparation
for a first year studies. In this connection there were elaborated the
theoretical bases of projecting of the consequent educational programmes within
the system of continuous education "secondary school - high school".
By the example of the elaboration of the reconsidered contents of an
educational discipline the way of realization of the consequent requirements to
the contents of continuous education on the basis of systemic-logical approach
was shown. The variants of such comprehensive programmes have been prepared. The question concerning the elaboration of a normative
base of the applicants' admission to the research university, the transmission
of students from other higher educational institutions onto the base and
research educational stages should be given special attention. The problem
should be given broader consideration from the point of view of the
effectiveness of human recourses' development in the interest of the whole
country, but not of one particular university. The point is that the level of social equality of
educational opportunities nowadays is the most important, recognized in the
whole world, indicator of the economic effeciency of the system of education.
It's impossible to allow that the education system development followed the way
of abilities' inequality escalation, which will prevent the growth of social
and educational mobility, the selection of the best, which will limit the
transmission from one specialty to another and will harden the possibilities of
joining the education at the later stages of education. Here we run into a
dilemma. On the one hand, the research technical university demonstrates rather
high requirements for students studying there. That's why the question
concerning a higher level of the applicants' education and the rational technology
of its achievement at the expense of pre-university preparation by the
university itself is rather urgent. On the other hand, we are still not aware
of the fact if we lose those many genuinely talented young people, who do not
possess the possibilities to pass such a hard preparative training for the
reasons not depending on their capabilities and talents. It seems obvious, that the structure of a research university, the
technology of educational process accepted in it must guarantee a successful and
effective promotion along the educational trajectory of those students,
admitted to the university in accordance with the criteria of a high level of
knowledge, as well as those students, who were admitted having not so prominent
level of knowledge according to the criteria of talent and gift, but proving
the abilities to study in accordance with the intensive programmes of a
research university. For such cases the university should foresee the
opportunities of mandatory training (alongside with regular classes on the
general curriculum) in the corresponding compensating disciplines, stipulated
by the individual educational plan. Such approach is widely applied in the best
research universities all over the world. Their plans include the corresponding
courses "of correction" for junior students. As for those who have
already got the Bachelor's degree in other institutions of higher education and
who want to continue their education according to the programme of the
post-graduate stage of a research university, for them the university structure
presupposes the so-called "university college", in which short-term
course of educational disciplines, the knowledge of which was recognized as
insufficient, is realized. This foreign experience, which can easily be transformed
onto the Russian soil, will be paid off by the expanse of educational
opportunities for the talented youth in the interest of the whole Russian
society. For these tasks' solving MGTU named after N.E.Bauman carries out the
researches on the elaboration of the corresponding educational technologies,
the ways of their realization have already been planned. Summing up all that has been said above, we can give
the following definition and formulate the following criteria of a Russian
research university. The Russian research technical university - is a
complex higher educational institution of an integration type, combining the
functions of a scientific-investigation institution, carrying out substantial
fundamental and applied investigations in the fields, defining the development
of scientific-technical progress, with the activity of an educational
institution, oriented to the transmission of the newest scientific, technical
and technological achievements to new generations and training elite specialists
of all the levels on the basis of the unity of educational process and
scientific investigations. A few words of the criteria of the research technical
university. 1. The existence and constant
development of the authoritative scientific and scientific-pedagogical school.
The high prestige and public recognition of the university at the federal
level. 2. The research university is
characterized by the graduation of the specialists at the base and
post-graduate stages in all the main engineering directions and in the main
directions of the humanities as well as social-economic and natural sciences
cycles. The necessity of this criterion comes from the fact
that in the opposite case it would be impossible to realize the educational
process according to the technology, typical of a research university:
interdisciplinary connections, a wide range of possibilities in the
individualization of educational plans by including fundamental disciplines of
any specialty. 3. Each department should
mandatory have a scientific-research laboratory or (for the humanities
departments) scientific-research staffs, directly in the complement of the
department itself or in the complement of scientific-research institutes of a
university. 4. Close connection with the
departments and institutes of RAS: the institute laboratories, being under the
scientific-methodical supervision of RAS, mutual scientific-educational
centers; the department divisions in RAS institutes, etc. 5. It's highly desirable that
all the departments of the research university, including those of general
education (physics, chemistry, mathematics), of general profession, and also
the humanities and social-economic, were "training" departments at
the post-graduate stage. Thus the scientific level of departments is stated,
the absence of a gap between the level of scientific development in the
corresponding field and the level of teaching is guaranteed, the
natural-scientific, social-economic and tithe humanities level of specialists'
preparation in an institute of higher education is increased and the increase
of the theoretical level of the applied investigations carried out in the
university is provided. 6. The amount of specialists
of the post-graduate stage must comprise not less than half of the total amount
of the base stage graduates. Alongside there should be a vast practice of
admission of alien students to the post-graduate step. 7. The developed system of a
goal-oriented graduate-school and post-graduate-school, training scientific and
pedagogical staff of a high qualification for the scientific institutions and
universities of Russia. 8. The university system of
post-doctor's stage of education (i.e. the departments or
scientific-investigation departments should have a sufficient number of
vacancies, given to talented graduates, who have got the Doctor's degree (PhD)
or a candidate's degree, for a scientific internship and further development of
their own research work). 9. The university should have
the centre of international education, wide international connections,
including the elaboration of research projects' (also in the field of
education) together with foreign research universities. 10. Information technologies.
The research university must have the main access to global information nets.
The possibility of students' work in a single information space. Distant
education. 11. International university
recognition. The introduction of wide scientific investigations according to
foreign companies' orders. 12. Up-to-date material base
for scientific investigations, the developed park of calculation technique for
the educational process and scientific investigations carrying out. 13. One of most important
criteria of a research university is the hierarchy of scientific-investigation
divisions, which include scientific and scientific-educational centers
(department, faculty, of mutual usage), scientific-research institutes, bases,
experimental areas, experimental production, etc. The most important indicator
of these departments' activity is an evident connection of their activity with
the scientific-research and educational activity of the research university
departments. It's necessary to take into consideration the prior
character of the criteria under consideration, arising from the theoretical
principles, elaborated within the preliminary investigations and, consequently,
subject to clarification and extension in the course of the programme practical
realization. Thus, we are in need of such evolution of the system
of education, which would adapt it to modern requirements and would create
conditions for the integration of higher education and academic science, the
realization of interdisciplinary approach to the specialists' training,
mobilizing of all the public forces for the restoration of the education
prestige and that of intellectual work. It's necessary to formulate the
programme of the priority support of Russian research technical universities,
which are called to make up its national property. |
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