Russian University Graduates Research Articles

Career trajectories of graduates of Russian universities of natural sciences and humanities

Introduction. The process of professional development of the country is influenced by global processes: digitalization, progressive science and institutional education, the emergence of new interdisciplinary scientific fields, the development of new factors of social mobility, the emergence of new professions, etc. This influence can be taken into account in the discrepancy between the desired labor and educational career paths with the fact that university graduates use life guidelines based on the level of dissatisfaction with their acquired profession and career. The purpose of the article is to demonstrate the distinctive features of the formation of career trajectories of university graduates who received education in the natural sciences and humanities. Materials and methods. To achieve this goal, an online questionnaire was conducted, in which 252 graduates of different years from 32 Russian universities of natural sciences and humanities took part. To process the data, sequential analysis of t-Student criteria (p = 0.05), factor analysis, and content analysis were used. Results. Special features of the formation of career trajectories have been identified: the assessment of the demand for knowledge and skills in the labor market among graduates of natural science faculties after a bachelor's degree is higher than among graduates of humanities (7.17 compared to 5.75); More often than not, graduates of natural science faculties (71.6 compared to 43.1) plan to work/continue to work in the specialty acquired as a bachelor’s degree; 67.9% of graduates of natural science faculties have a longer planning horizon (several years) (compared to 43.1). from 32.1%); 26% of “techies” continue their work dynasty (compared with 6%); %); significant values for graduates of humanities are “harmony of personal life and career” (4.49 on average 4.01), “social recognition” (3.42 on average 2.95) and “emotional health” (4.52 on average 4.11), while for “techies” the opportunity to realize their entrepreneurial abilities is more significant (3.2 on average 2.75). “Humanitarians” compared to “technical specialists” are potentially more ready for sabbatical (3.46 on average 2.78), downshifting (2.65 on average 2.18) and relocation (3.40 on average 2.73). Four types of career trajectories were identified among graduates of humanities faculties (using the rotation method – Varimax): balanced multipotential, stagnant uncertain, innovative and altruistic escapism. For graduates of natural sciences, such differentiation is not defined. Conclusion. The data obtained allow us to conclude that graduates of natural science faculties have more employment opportunities due to the compliance of university training with the requirements of employers. For graduates of humanities faculties, the career trajectory is more variable, unstable, has a fluctuating nature and is associated primarily with horizontal mobility, while for graduates of natural science faculties the career trajectory is less variable and has a greater tendency toward upward mobility

DISCIPLINARY LITERACY IN
 THE GLOBAL SCHOLARLY COMMUNITY:
 CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS

Russian university graduates and academics face significant challenges to become
 full-fledged participants of the global scholarly community. One of the most common, yet
 sometimes overlooked causes of this situation is the lack of disciplinary literacy. Disciplinary
 literacy is defined as the ability to appropriately participate in the communicative practices of a
 discipline. The paper investigates the factors that lead to the expansion of the requirements for
 disciplinary literacy in today’s globalised world. Based on the analysis of literature and their
 own experience of teaching ESAP (English for Specific Academic Purposes) in a pedagogical
 university, the authors put forward the idea that in many cases the best way to tackle the
 problems of disciplinary literacy may be to use elements of the constructivist approach to
 teaching this subject.

Work-Related Learning Practices of University Graduates: Scope and Determinants

The article analyzes the scale of work-related learning of recent higher education graduates, describes its main practices, determines the factors of participation in training. The empirical analysis is carried out on data from the federal survey of Russian university graduates who completed their studies in 2016-2020. The sample consists of 9325 graduates. About a quarter of recent graduates participated in job-related training in their first year of work. The probability of work-related learning is higher for full-time graduates and for those who are employed as a specialist. It does not depend on whether the graduate works in his specialty or not. Important predictors of participation in work-related learning are the lack of professional skills and the importance of personal (individual) characteristics for successful work. The results showed that work-related learning acts as a tool to overcome the gap between the knowledge and skills that graduates have and the knowledge and skills necessary for the employer, mainly professional content. It was found that participation in work-related training practices is differentiated by qualification groups and by the scarcity of different types of knowledge and skills. On the one hand, formal learning and, on the other, mentoring and self-learning are interchangeable practices. Mentoring and self-learning are in many ways complementary practices of job-related training.

Экономическая грамотность студентов российских вузов как условие успеха выпускников на рынке труда и профилактики безработицы

Today it is especially important to consider education, in particular higher education, in the context of the investment sphere of the state, since it belongs to the largest industries of any country in the world. Young specialists – graduates of Russian universities for a number of geopolitical, economic, social, cultural and other reasons in the coming years will massively face the problems of decent employment after graduation, since they choose the areas of education before the large-scale change of economic and political priorities of the state. Consequently, economic literacy in a broad context and financial literacy in a narrow subject today has become an acute problem area for students of Russian universities, especially non-economic profile. It acts as a primary tool for creating means of adaptation of young people in the labor market and prevention of unemployment. Teaching at the university, discussing problem areas with students, including students with disabilities, we identified their concerns about adaptation to society from the position of employment, financial well-being, which is reflected in our previous research. This prompted the search for tools and methodology for solving an urgent topic.

Horizontal job-education mismatches and earnings of university graduates in Russia

ABSTRACT The study is devoted to the evaluation of the determinants of job-education mismatches and their impact on salaries of university graduates. We use a comprehensive and nationally representative survey of Russian university graduates. The study employs a self-evaluated measure of mismatch and a statistical variant for robustness and interpretation purposes. We find that one-third of the graduates in Russia are horizontally mismatched, and that the share of mismatched graduates in Russia is higher than the average in OECD countries. Graduates from fields that generate more general human capital, or where low pay is common, are more likely to be mismatched. On the contrary, graduates in Medicine, which is a more specialised field, are more likely to be matched. We find that mismatches negatively affect the earnings of university graduates and, the higher is the degree of mismatch, the higher is the penalty for the mismatch. The study depicts that mismatch is penalised in the majority of fields except for low-paid ones.

СОЦИАЛЬНЫЕ ТЕХНОЛОГИИ В КОНТЕКСТЕ ТРУДОУСТРОЙСТВА ВЫПУСКНИКОВ ВУЗОВ

The article deals with the problems of managing the employment of university graduates in modern conditions. The existing practical experience in managing the employment of university graduates at Belgorod enterprises allows us to consider this process not just as a "method of managerial activity", but as a technology. The urgent need for employment of graduates of Russian universities in their specialty, taking into account the increasing need of enterprises, especially industrial ones, for highly qualified personnel, determines the relevance of this study. The results of our sociological research among graduates of Belgorod universities and managers of enterprises indicate that one of the effective social technologies is employment management. As we found out, the majority of graduates of V.G. Shukhov BSTU get a job through the scientific and methodological center for professional adaptation and employment of graduates (12.5%), through the BSTU employment center (14.5%), using messengers (Tele-gram). It is concluded that the system and personnel technologies of training and advanced training of personnel at the expense of the budget of enterprises and organizations that have proven their effectiveness are still not being used at the enterprises of the Belgorod region.

Adaptation of Chinese Students in the Multicultural Environment of Russian Higher Education in the Period of Distance Learning

The processes of globalization lead to a constant increase in mobility. The changing society has long ceased to be a closed and limited system of nation-states. The aim of the research is to determine the conditions of social adaptation of students in multicultural environment in the period of distance learning. The problem of finding the concept that provides adaptability and sustainability of the personality, capable of successful development and interaction in the multicultural space of the Russian university is actualized. A series of sociological studies on the problems of interaction between Russian and Chinese students in the educational space of universities was conducted. In 2016, the project «Russian-Chinese dialogue: the way to meet each other» was implemented within the Program of development of student associations’ activities supported by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation 2016-PSO-94 with our participation. A survey involved Chinese and Russian students from three universities in Yekaterinburg (500 Russian and 500 Chinese students participated in the survey). In 2019-2020 a survey was carried out among Russian universities according to the author’s methodology of the matrix of four bases (500 Chinese students). In 2020, we dealt with 2 focus groups with Chinese students. and administered in-depth interviews with Chinese professionals who graduated from Russian higher education (50 Chinese graduates of Russian universities). The geography of the research included the leading universities of Moscow, Yekaterinburg, Tyumen, Chelyabinsk. The obtained data and coordination of the conclusions with a number of studies require creating a system for training multicultural educatorsto provide distance learning.

ОБУЧЕНИЕ КИТАЙСКОМУ ЯЗЫКУ КАК ВТОРОМУ ИНОСТРАННОМУ: КОММУНИКАТИВНЫЕ И КУЛЬТУРНЫЕ АСПЕКТЫ

At present, Sinology is rapidly developing all over the world. A large number of foreigners are learning Chinese. Scientists note the inextricable link between society, culture, history, geography and language. In this regard, communication is a complex process that requires careful and conscious immersion in the language context. The purpose of the article is to study the features of teaching Chinese as a second foreign language. The objectives of the study are to identify the specifics of the development of students' communicative competence, to characterize the essence and structure of communicative competence, which includes social and cultural knowledge, to analyze intralinguistic and extralinguistic elements of teaching Chinese as a second foreign language in the context of intercultural communication. The following methods were used in the article: comparison, retrospective analysis and system-logical analysis. The author gives a description of communicative strategies in the study of the Chinese language, and also considers issues related to their choice in relation to various factors. The focus of the research are communicative tasks which are a key element of teaching the Chinese language and the experimental verification of the effectiveness of the model of professionally oriented teaching of the Chinese language to students of the humanities in Russian universities. The results of the study show that extracurricular activities increase students' motivation to learn Chinese, increase the level of self-organization and responsibility. A well-built model of professionally oriented education, which includes a large amount of extracurricular activities, is effective in terms of the formation of intercultural competence necessary for the further work of graduates of Russian universities.

The Mission of Teaching: to the 100th Anniversary of R.B. Nurtazina

The article analyzes the role and significance of R.B. Nurtazina in the development of modern Kazakhstani linguodidactics. The reason for writing the article was the First International Pedagogical Readings School - Teacher - Innovations in the Modern World, held at Pavlodar Pedagogical University from March 1 to March 9, 2021. The co-organizers were Al-Farabi Kazakh National University (RK, Almaty), L.N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University (RK, Nur-Sultan), Peoples Friendship University of Russia (RF, Moscow), Kazakhstan Association of Teachers of the Russian Language and Literature (KAZPRYAL), Kazakhstan Public Association Graduates of Russian Universities, Academy of Childrens Books ALTAIR and a team of scientific educational project Epoch and Personality.

Corporate Education in Russia. Prerequisites for Development, Current Tasks, Construction Models

Introduction. The period of active global cybernetization and business automation was marked by a problem for Russian employers in the form of a shortage of qualified personnel capable of ensuring the development and competitiveness of business in the world markets.Methodology and sources. Sociology of education as a social institution has been developing since 1970 s. Its current theoretical foundation is based on two principles: 1) The principle of mutual convergence of social institutions (education – business, education – state, education – family); 2) Variety of educational practices as a factual manifestation of the phenomenon of continuous education. Today corporative learning is one of such practices that radically change the ecosystem of traditional education.Results and discussion. There was a problem of forming a system of training new human resources that meet the changing economic realities. Until the 1990s, before the collapse of the country and the beginning of political and economic reforms, the Russian Federation had a system of higher education as one of the most stable and well-established mechanisms for training personnel for all sectors of the economy. An indicator of the effectiveness of this system was that graduates of Russian universities were invited to work by well-known corporations from many countries of the world.Over the years of reforms, Russia has lost its previous model of education, which today significantly affects the quality of training. Many Russian enterprises are forced to follow the path of independent training and retraining of specialists. Development of corporative is necessary to compensate for the limitations of traditional higher education. At first, the training was organized locally and had a haphazard character, but over time, Russian entrepreneurs began to adopt foreign experience in forming a knowledge system in the company and even create corporate universities.Conclusion. The study examines the prerequisites for the formation of the system and the development of the corporate education market, provides current models of knowledge accumulation and suggests the author's cognitive model of professional development of personnel.

Прекаризация занятости молодежи в контексте последствий пандемии COVID-19

Objective: to assess the impact of coronavirus (COVID-19) on the youth labor market in the context of the spread of precarization processes in employment.Methods: qualitative methods were used to analyze labor market institutions, together with in-depth interviews and interpretative analysis of actors’ discourses.Results: the COVID-2019 pandemic posed new challenges to the economy and contributed to the active development of new employment formats and employer-employee interaction in the form of informal employment, freelance platforms, and precariat development. The article considers the features and risks of informal and non-standard employment. Based on the labor market analysis, we determined the impact of the pandemic on working conditions, inequality growth and the increasing role of the informal sector. The impact of the crisis on employment conditions for young people with higher education is particularly emphasized. To form the models of students’ behavior under the conditions of labor market instability, the authors conducted in-depth interviews with students and graduates of the Southern Federal University to assess the employment opportunities of university graduates. The characteristics of respondents’ perception of the processes associated with precarization in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic consequences are clarified and specified. Scientific novelty: it consists in the development of theoretical and methodological approaches to the analysis of precarization of youth employment in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic consequences. It is shown that the observed increase of employment precarization is associated with behavioral features caused by dominant behavioral models and distortions in the perception of unstable employment by university graduates in relation to the structural opportunities provided by the labor market.Practical significance: the identified features of employment of the Russian university graduates can be used to develop recommendations for improving the system for monitoring the employment precarization level in the regional labor markets.

ВОЗМОЖНОСТИ И РИСКИ ДИСТАНЦИОННЫХ ФОРМ ЗАНЯТОСТИ ДЛЯ СТУДЕНТОВ И ВЫПУСКНИКОВ ВЫСШИХ УЧЕБНЫХ ЗАВЕДЕНИЙ

The object of the research is the university students and graduates who are about to enter the labor market or are at the beginning of their career path. The purpose of the research is to determine what factors influence the choice of distance employment by students and graduates and to formulate recommendations for Russian companies on how to implement distance employment for these employees. The authors applied the methods of analysis and synthesis of scientific literature, as well as processed the databases of international companies and Russian Federal State Statistics Service (Rosstat), and conducted a survey of students and graduates in 38 Russian regions, who are to graduate or graduated in the period between 2017 and 2025, using an online questionnaire from February to March 2020. The analysis of the survey results was carried out using the construction of econometric models. According to the research results, the main advantage of distance employment for students and graduates is the ability to independently distribute working hours, and the main disadvantage is the presence of a large number of distractions from everyday life. At the same time, those representatives of the target group who had the experience of remote work are more likely to choose this form of employment in the future. As a result of the study, the degree of influence of distance forms of employment on the labor market of students and graduates of Russian universities was identified and analyzed. For this target group, distance employment has both advantages and serious risks, which makes the topic relevant. From a practical perspective, this study may be useful for HR management experts, as well as university administration officials, since the transfer of employees to remote work allows companies and institutions to continue to function successfully during periods of quarantine and self-isolation.

Corporate education in personnel training for engineering and civil engineering industries

Period of active global cybernation and business automation was marked by a problem for Russian employers in the form of a shortage of qualified personnel capable of ensuring the development and competitiveness in world business markets. There was a problem of forming a system for training new human resources that would satisfy the changing economic realities. The Russian Federation had a higher education system as one of the most stable and well-functioning mechanisms for training personnel for all economical sectors until the 90th of the last century, before the country collapse and the beginning of political and economic reforms. An indicator of the system effectiveness was that the graduates of Russian universities were invited to work by well-known corporations from many countries of the world. Over the years of the reforms, Russia has lost its previous model of education, which significantly affects the quality of personnel training today [1]. Many Russian enterprises are forced to follow the path of independent training and specialists retraining. At first, training was organized locally, it was by chance, but Russian entrepreneurs began to adopt foreign experience in forming a knowledge system in a company and even create corporate universities over the time. The study examines preconditions for the system formation and the corporate education market development, provides current models of knowledge accumulation and proposes the author's cognitive model of personnel professional development.

Восприятие государственной политики в области занятости молодежи в контексте прекаризации выпускников

Objective: to assess the students and graduates’ perception of the state policy aimed at supporting young professionals in the labor market.Methods: qualitative methods were used to analyze labor market institutions, in-depth interviews were conducted, and interpretative analysis of actors’ discourses was made.Results: the authors’ conceptual conclusions make it possible to characterize the unstable position of university graduates in the structure of precariat in the Russian labor market. Two types of reasons are considered that determine whether university graduates are included in the precariat within the framework of the “work experience - education” dichotomy. The article analyzes the features of the Russian labor market and the proposed state policy measures to transform traditional forms of employment using the achievements of digitalization. In-depth interviews were conducted with students and graduates of the Southern Federal University to assess their perception of the state policy and attitude to unstable employment.Scientific novelty: to understand the place and role of precariat in the structure of employment, it is necessary to consider such characteristics, in addition to instability, as the level of education and the level of skills acquired.Practical significance: the identified social values and employment characteristics of Russian university graduates can be used to develop recommendations for improving the system for monitoring the level of labor precarization in regional labor markets.

Job search strategies of recent university graduates: prevalence and effectiveness

PurposeThe purpose of the paper is to analyse the prevalence and effectiveness of methods and strategies for job searches amongst recent graduates of Russian universities.Design/methodology/approachThe empirical analysis is carried out on data from the Russian Graduate Survey 2016, which is representative of individuals graduating during 2010–2015. The sample included 12,370 individuals. The empirical approach combined standard descriptive statistics, factor and regression analysis (multiple logit regression).FindingsResults show that the most common strategies are a combined strategy that involves the use of formal and informal methods, as well as “pure” informal strategies – applying to relatives and friends or contacting employers. The most effective strategies are job searches with the help of relatives and friends, by contacting employers and with the help of educational organisations. The choice of job search strategy is determined by the expected return in terms of the likelihood of finding a job.Practical implicationsThe paper increases understanding of graduate job search behaviour. The results can be used by multiple stakeholders in higher education to better prepare students for job seeking.Originality/valueThis research, based on a large field survey of recent university graduates, provides the first estimates of use of job search strategies and their effectiveness for Russian university graduates.

On the current situation with the russian language in the cis and foreign countries

In recent years, the situation with the Russian language presence in the CIS and foreign countries has changed. Statesmen of range of former Soviet republics in their plans to involve schoolchildren and students in further development of relations with Russia and encourage the use, the Russian language in their work, consider the possibility of the labor market expansion, closer cooperation in the sphere of education in Russian largest universities, and of science partnership with Russian scientific institutions. Europe, Asia and Africa face an increase in interest in the studying of the Russian language. Homever, its position declines in some countries, for example in Germany. Russian was a compulsory course in public schools of former socialist countries till 1990, but after the collapse of the socialist system, their governments abandoned this practice. But in recent years Russian language is gaining popularity among students, for example, in Poland and the Czech Republic. The Chinese, South Koreans and the Indian people also show interest in studying Russian language, literature and culture. En Africa Russian is spoken by the graduates of Russian universities and people who worked with Russian partners. Due to positive changes in the Russian economy, its business relations with foreign partners, and the need to communicate in Russian when working together, there is some increase in the number of foreigners who choose to study the Russian language. En addition, this is often associated with the desire to learn Russian language in order to embrace national Russian values.

Migration policy towards skilled labor in the Russian Federation

The article analyzes the policy of the Russian Federation towards skilled foreign labor in retrospect — from the moment of the collapse of the USSR to the present day. It is shown that throughout the recent history of law-making and in practice, labor migrants have been considered mainly as a temporary phenomenon despite the country’s need for qualified personnel who could become a part of its resident population. The article attempts to systematize existing channels of skilled migration and provides main principles of their operation. It is shown that, with the exception of a program aimed at the so-called highly skilled specialists (HSS), other forms of attracting foreign workers do not offer a package of conditions that can interest potential migrants in moving to Russia. The system of attracting HSS has not yet shown its effectiveness and is mainly used for simplified temporary access to the Russian labor market. The State Program of assistance to the resettlement of compatriots, formally intended for migrants with ethnic and cultural affinity to the population of Russia, actually uses the principles of selection of skilled labor migrants. Only at the end of 2019, steps were taken that made it easier for graduates of Russian universities and technical schools, as well as specialists with professions in demand, to obtain a residence permit. However, these steps look half-hearted. Comparing the Russian experience with the practice of some foreign countries gives grounds for thinking about what tools and approaches can improve the effectiveness of the Russian policy towards qualified migrants and arouse their interest in moving to our country for permanent residence.

PROBLEMS OF DISTANCE EDUCATION

The purpose of this paper is to identify problem areas in the field of distance education. These areas are educational content, the form in which the material is presented, the quality of distance education, the inclusion of distance education in full-time education programs, as well as the focus on the customer in education with a view to the student's employment. To identify the educational content of distance education portals, the authors have performed a comparative analysis of the most popular distance education sites. In the analysis, the authors have assessed the sites, focusing on a comparison of goals, the orientation of training, the attractiveness of design, and the ease of use. The quality of distance education is evaluated based on open statistical sources of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation and the Pension Fund of Russia which collect information about graduates of Russian universities and verify them based on the personal insurance policy number. The authors also consider research data from the Higher School of Economics. The main results of the study include an analysis of successes in the development of distance education by large educational organizations, assessment of the quality of education based on statistical data on employment, and identification of trends and ways of using distance education in full-time education programs. The analysis presented in the paper can be used in organizing correspondence courses and distance education programs, as well as using distance learning methods in full-time education programs.

Graduates of Russian Universities in the Labor Market (Data from the Rosstat Survey)

The materials from a representative survey of Rosstat in 2016 of higher education graduates in 2010–2015 allowed to analyze the processes of their employment. Almost ½ worked during the education that provided advantages in employment. After graduation, 2/3 searched for work and found it relatively quickly, using most often social networks; 1/3 were not busy looking for work, of which ¼ had a provided job. Imbalances between the structure of supply and the structure of demand in the labor market led to the fact that about 1/3 of graduates got a job that did not related to their field of study; more likely ones from fields that generate more general human capital (social sciences, business, law) – on the contrary, for specific human capital (medicine, computer science). Besides, more than a 1/3 of graduates acquired occupational statuses that do not require higher education; the mismatches “job – field of study” significantly worsened this situation. HE graduates had higher employment and lower unemployment compared to SVE graduates; and the differences in average salaries between them were significantly smaller than for all employees with similar levels of education. The beginning of a career evens out the differences in average salaries of HE graduates who have received different statuses.

Образов ательные платформы дистанционного образов ания в росс ийских и китайских ву зах: нов ые вызов ы высшей школе

The article provides a comparative analysis of digital educational platforms used in the practice of Russian and Chinese universities. Our conclusions are based on the comparative data on Russia and China published in the reports of UNESCO, International Labour Organization, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Council of Europe and European Economic Community (EEC), Asia-Pacific Programme of Innovation in Education for Development (APEID). In addition, the article provides data from two sociological studies carried out by the authors themselves. The first study was conducted between January and February 2020. The study was conducted by means of a survey, personal interview (N = 600). Students from Moscow, Ekaterinburg, Chelyabinsk and Tyumen took part in the survey. The quantitative research data were supplemented by in-depth interviews with Chinese graduates of Russian universities (postgraduates, master’s students) in the amount of 50 pieces (N = 50). Also in March — May 2020, we conducted a sociological survey in the universities of Ekaterinburg, Chelyabinsk, and Moscow. In the course of the research we interviewed 500 students who had gained experience in distance learning during the pandemic. Qualitative research — in-depth interview method (N = 20), average duration of the interview is 90 minutes. Informants were the faculty of higher educational institutions of Yekaterinburg, Moscow and St. Petersburg. Frame analysis of cases was also conducted (N = 42). The analysis of these cases made it possible to identify the most popular digital technologies in the educational process, as well as their main advantages and disadvantages.