THE CHALLENGES OF HIGHER SCHOOL REFORMING

The paper discusses the issues related to the radical reforming of the higher education system in Russia. The authors indicate positive tendencies associated with the accession to Bologna convention and the transition to two-tier educational system manifested in the specific progress of Russian colleges on the way of integration into the global educational environment and consider negative consequences of overcommercialization of the educational field, narrow-minded interpretation and exaggerated implementation of the competency-based approach. The paper draws attention to the de-emphasis, in some degree, of the fundamental mathematical and natural-science knowledge specified by the state educational standards of a number of baccalaureate training programs. The authors discuss the problematic aspects of distance education expansion and give the results of the pedagogical study in the form of a survey of freshman students of the Ural State University of Economics carried out in order to identify psychological preparedness for modern methods of distance implementation of certain stages and procedures of the educational process. It is showed that this preparedness requires visible correction on the basis of the formation of culture based on the academic ethics principles. The authors note the essential increase of teachers’ intensity of work caused by the essential strengthening of bureaucratization of the educational sphere, the imperfection of system of the efficiency and material stimulation indices and, as a consequence, the unreasonably sizable volume of work on formation of normative methodology documentation and the overgrowth of publication activities not promoting the ensuring of the educational process quality. It is highlighted that the overcoming of difficulties and problematic aspects of the higher school reforming and the further progressive development of the sphere is possible when considering the domestic experience and steady traditions of the state educational institutions.