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Is the ideal of a one‐size‐fits‐all university model—where universities are capable of successfully performing all competencies simultaneously—ever achievable? Has the balance between teaching and research activities grown even more fragile or is such a balance unfeasible? In this paper, we review studies of institutional diversity in higher education and bibliometric analyses. We prose a two‐dimensional typology based on diversity in teaching and research by scientific fields. We investigate the diversity in teaching and research, respectively, at the disciplinary level and address whether these primary activities mirror each other. As a measure of mismatch between the two activities, we assess the distribution of students and publications by scientific fields through a clustering analysis. Our study of higher education institutions (HEIs) in Russia reveals that private universities are less diverse both in research and teaching and have high teaching intensity compared to state universities. Expectedly, universities in the rankings have more diverse profiles and they have a higher research intensity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: This ethnographic story explores fiction‐making in the context of audit cultures and accountability regimes. Based on a critical multi‐sited ethnography conducted between 2011 and 2015 in the Russian Federation, this composite narrative draws on eighty interviews, casual conversations, and observations at several universities. It documents how educators at higher education institutions responded to audit reviews by constructing paper façades of reports and curriculum documents that obscured what they were doing or how their departments were run. When an inspection took place, the reviewers focused on paperwork to infer the quality of educational services. The fictions and paper façades created to convince the state that institutions were functioning well also sheltered the illicit practices and corruption that operated at various levels of the institutional hierarchy. In this audit theater, faculty participated in producing fakery, dupery, and swagger that protected them from immediate punishment, but they ended up feeling cheated by their own production. As educators navigated new reporting requirements, they also made sense of the state's own fakery, hypocrisy, and duplicity. New relationships among educators, institutions, and the state created by accountability regimes produced a politics of disposability to sustain state fictions of success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper challenges the view that internationalisation of higher education is a 'global public good' by examining the growing tension between centres and peripheries in higher education. We argue for the need to develop new conceptual frameworks of internationalisation that recognise the uneven landscape of higher education, and that take greater account of the local (socio-political and geographic) contexts in which institutions are situated. Drawing on a recent study of universities in the less explored Eastern regions of Russia, this paper shows how Klemenčič's integrated approach to higher education internationalisation provides a useful conceptual framework for exploring and potentially guiding the internationalisation process in higher education institutions in the periphery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the impact a Russian amended law concerning state secrets is having on science publishing by Russian scientists. It states President Vladimir Putin used a decree in May 2015 expanding the scope of a law requiring scientists get permission from the Federal Security Service prior to publishing results which could have industrial or military applications. It reports Russian universities are requiring scientists seek approval to the publication of any findings without exception.

EU-Russia higher education cooperation has continued despite global tensions including Crimea incorporation. One example of this cooperation is the development of Finnish-Russian double degree programmes. This paper focuses on institutional environments where double degrees develop and asks how and why they produce uncertainty from inside Finnish and Russian universities in the period of this unfavourable political situation. The matryoshka model is applied to understand the institutional environment of a university and the institutions around it. The institutional nature of a double degree is determined by comparative analysis of how internal university stakeholders in Finland and Russia perceive a programme’s benchmarks. The study is based on the analysis of interviews conducted in partner universities. This paper discusses how perceptions of double degrees influence uncertainty in programme provision within and between institutional environments in Finnish and Russian universities. In addition, the level of institutionalisation of the double degrees may be evaluated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The literature on the consequences of academic inbreeding shows ambiguous results: some papers show that inbreeding positively influences research productivity measured by the quantity and quality of publications, while others demonstrate the opposite effect. There are contradictory results both in the studies of different countries and within countries. This variety of results makes it impossible to transfer the findings from one academic system to another, and in Russia this problem has been under-explored. This paper focuses on the relationship between inbreeding and publication activity among Russian faculty. The research was conducted using data from the ‘Monitoring of Educational Markets and Organizations’ survey. The results show that there is no significant effect of academic inbreeding on publication productivity: no substantial and robust differences in publication activity between inbreds and non-inbreds have been found. The paper finishes with a discussion of possible explanations inherent in the Russian academic system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research is devoted to studying the motivation of students to continue their education in the higher education system - in the magistracy, graduate school and the system of additional postgraduate professional education. During the study, first-year and fourth-year students of the Institute of Physical Culture, Sports and Tourism of Petrozavodsk State University were interviewed. The relevance of this research paper is to identify the main motivesamong junior and senior students for continuing their education, taking into account the socio-economic situation in the Russian Federation and in the world at the moment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents an attempt to develop a practice-oriented philosophy course for students of bachelor programs in the Russian higher education institutions. A special emphasis is placed on the daily problems encountered by a human and the ways to overcome them with the help of philosophy. In the authors' opinion, such approach points to the rightful place of philosophy in the programs for students pursuing non-philosophical specialties in higher school, and allows to increase interest to studying philosophy as part of the bachelor program. In connection therewith, it has been proposed to structure the philosophy course as follows: philosophy as the search for meaning, philosophy of values, philosophy of activity, philosophy of life. The course sections presented in the sequence suggested above provide a possibility to approach philosophy as a practical, instrumental field of human knowledge helping an individual to change own self and own life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper compares the university education system in three countries: the Russian Federation, the Republic of Moldova and Romania. Even though they are part of different geo-political and cultural spaces, the three states have important similarities in higher education. In all three countries processes of university education reform have been carried out to modernize and adapt to the demands of globalization and the new communication society. Also, the relation to the trends and contents of European higher education has been and remains a constant of the managerial activity of education ministries and of other institutions with educational attributions. At the same time, there are differences between the higher education systems of the Russian Federation, the Republic of Moldova and Romania, which come from the specifics of their evolution so far, but also from the society in which they operate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of the paper is to develop the scientific and methodological provision of an audit of training of digital personnel for the regional economy in the conditions of Industry 4.0 by the example of regional flagship universities of modern Russia. Design/methodology/approach: The authors use the method of regression analysis for determining the dependence of the level of digitization of regions' economy on the competitiveness of their basic universities. The research is performed by the example of regions of the Volga Federal District of the Russian Federation, in which there are regional flagship universities as of early 2019. Findings: It is determined that audit of training of digital personnel for the regional economy in the conditions of Industry 4.0 in modern Russia is conducted within the monitoring of the effectiveness of universities by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation. Most of the indicators that are necessary for the audit of training of digital personnel for the regional economy in the conditions of Industry 4.0 are not taken into account. The data of the monitoring allow compiling a fragmentary idea of the potential of a regional flagship university in training of digital personnel for the regional economy in the conditions of Industry 4.0, while the results of this training are not assessed or controlled. This leads to low potential and low efficiency of Russia's regional flagship universities in training of digital personnel for the regional economy in the conditions of Industry 4.0. Originality/value: The forms for an audit of training of digital personnel for the regional economy in the conditions of Industry 4.0 by the regional flagship university are developed. The indicators of the potential and results of the university in training of digital personnel are combined with the existing methodology of evaluation of the effectiveness of universities in Russia. An additional advantage of the authors' recommendations is the universal character of the developed forms, which allows using them in other countries for an audit of training of digital personnel for the regional economy in the conditions of Industry 4.0. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers new challenges for Russian universities and the state, including flourishing and widespread corruption, politicization and state pressure, and student activism, and hypothesizes on how these three may be linked. To do so, this paper uses systematic research of media accounts from 2007 to 2012 in order to investigate student activism and its possible links with corruption and university politicization. This paper develops a theoretical extension that explains the corruption and coercion mechanism as applied to student activism, and places emphasis on higher education corruption and state pressure applied to universities. This study concludes that students are more interested in fighting for their economic rights and fulfilment of contractual obligations by the universities, while remaining politically inactive. This is normal for modern Russian society, where market reforms in higher education gain momentum, while democratic changes in the country remain very slow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reviews some government policy measures aimed at strengthening competition in the Russian university market and looks at the best international practices in this area. It analyzes the competitive behavior of universities under the current government policy on higher education and research and development and suggests an approach to assessing the efficiency of government stimulation of competition among universities and to predicting the outcomes of applying existing stimulation tools. This paper presents the results of assessing the current level of competition in the Russian university market using a nonstructural method, an adjusted Panzar-Rosse competition assessment model. We used the value of grants received by universities as part of government orders as one of the model factors and also analyzed the effects of other factors describing the size, entrance requirements, and research activities of universities. This article investigates how university income depends on the value of grants received (a ratio of total income to the size of grants) and on the number of students and teachers. The level of competition in this market is characterized by the elasticity of the total income of an average university based on the value of grants received. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Many students have to choose their future profession during their last years in the high school and therefore to choose a university where they will get proper education. That choice may define their professional life for many years ahead or probably for the rest of their lives. Bauman Moscow State Technical University conducts various events to introduce future professions to high-school students. Such activity helps them to pick specialization in line with their interests and motivates them to study key scientific subjects. The paper focuses on newly developed educational tools to encourage high school students’ interest in STEM disciplines. These tools include laboratory courses developed in the fields of physics, information technologies and mathematics. More than 2000 high school students already participated in these experimental courses. These activities are aimed at increasing the quality of STEM disciplines learning which will result in higher quality of training of future engineers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The fundamental changes in the political and economic domains in Russia in the late 1990s affected the Russian scientific community profoundly. This paper focuses on the effects on the Russian higher education system. Today about 75% of the students study in the provinces. The new multi-channel funding system in Russia had a strong impact on R&D in the universities. Provincial universities are becoming a key source of new knowledge and skills. This paper discusses the factors influencing research activity in the different geographical regions and looks at intra- and international collaboration and at access to information and communication technology as important factors for sustainability in the Russian regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses official Russian discourse on educational diplomacy—that is, discourse that prioritizes the political rationale for internationalization of higher education. When Russia promotes its higher education abroad and recruits international students to Russian universities on the territory of the Russian Federation (RF) or abroad, it engages in educational diplomacy as part of its public diplomacy activities. Thus, in official discourse, cross-border education should also serve foreign-policy goals. Economic, cultural, and academic rationales do co-exist, but they are instrumental to the political rationale. This becomes evident with the emphasis on the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) as the “target audience” for Russia’s higher education promotion and the main recruitment area, in line with Russia’s foreign-policy priorities; and the understanding that cross-border education would help Russia to enhance its negative external image and that alumni would function as “Russian diplomats” after returning home. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the characteristics of students admitted to Russian universities with different levels of selectivity. First, we argue that students differ not only by the results of the Unified State Exam (USE), the university entrance exam, but by family and school characteristics, and by educational strategies. Next, it is shown that the probability of being admitted to the most selective HEIs is determined not only by the USE scores, but by characteristics that are not directly related to the applicants' abilities, such as class specialisation in secondary schools, and high school location. Moreover, we have found that income has an indirect impact on the admission results: a higher level of income increases the probability of being admitted to highly selective universities through the level of investment in pre-entry coaching and the regional differences in wages. On the other hand, regional differences in costs of living decrease the opportunities of studying in selective universities. Hence, schooling and financial barriers without alternative student support can limit the participation of less affluent students in selective universities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Field training is seen as a central component of the discipline of Physical Geography and an essential part of the undergraduate curriculum. This paper explores the structure and relationships between fieldwork and theoretical courses and the abundant experiences of field training in the undergraduate curriculum of 37 Russian universities. It details a case study of the Faculty of Geography, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Russia's largest center of geographical scholarship and training with 860 employees, which admits about 1000 undergraduates and 180 PhD students annually. Here, the total duration of field training extends up to 18 weeks annually and involves 14 (11 Physical Geography) specialist departments. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The paper describes realization of a university information storage and retrieval system using Semantic Web technology. A portal is designed on the base of the Research Institute platform provided by the Russian Academy of Sciences. The subject domain ontology developed by the author, the system architecture, its resources and services are described. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper refers to a contemporary discussion of S&T and innovation activities of Russian universities and respective national policies against the background of institutional transformation of the national innovation system. It emphasizes the Russian NIS structure and subsequent positioning of universities and the research institutions of the Academy of Sciences. The analysis makes it evident that the innovation activity of Russian universities is strongly challenged by various interdependent hampering factors. These factors arise directly from traditional barriers between science and education, which in turn relate to the imperfection of Russia's NIS originating from deep structural breaches far beyond S&T and education activities. National policies nowadays are aimed at increasing the innovation activity of universities, and the article concludes with an overview of the current debate on the most urgent issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The transition from a planned centralist economy to a market economy over the last decade of the 20th century has presented Russian universities with many profound challenges. These challenges require universities to review and consider their organisational culture and deserve careful study. This paper describes the changes that have taken place at Tomsk Polytechnic University – one of oldest, largest and leading Russian universities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes how the Excellence Model® developed by the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) can be used and applied within higher education, with practical examples accompanying the Model in a Russian University to raise management quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the history of Christianity in Russia dates back to the tenth century, the history of private Christian higher education in Russia is no more than a decade. This paper first explains the historical reasons for this fact and then describes the contemporary development of faith-based private education in Russia over the past decade. When Russia's system of higher education first developed, both the system and the Russian Orthodox Church were under the centralized control of the Russian government. Thus, although Christian perspectives and practices influenced Russian higher education, the Orthodox Church did not start or control universities. The period of communist control in Russia meant that Russian Orthodox perspectives and practices in Russian universities were abolished. Only in the post-communist era have a small number of Christian colleges and universities begun to emerge. These schools represent an interesting cross-section of Christian groups and a unique element in Russia's emerging system of private education. These institutions face numerous and unique challenges in the current Russian climate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the relationships of various employees' identifications (personal, interpersonal, micro-group, group and organizational) in their two components (cognitive and affective) with two dimensions of organizational citizenship behavior (OCB): offering quality ideas and suggestions, and providing help and support within small work groups. Two studies were conducted in Russia on two respective samples: (1) employees of commercial enterprises (N = 183) characterized by a relatively high regularity and intensity of within-group interactions; and (2) the academic staff of higher education institutions (N = 157), which typically have relatively less regular, low-intensity within-group interactions. The research employed four questionnaires to assess the participants' identifications in both of their components. In addition, managers in the respective organizations filled out an organizational communicativeness questionnaire and a two-factor OCB assessment instrument. It was found that the relationships between (a) particular identifications and (b) the ratio of group identification to other identifications, on the one hand, and OCB, on the other, depend on the degree of regularity of within-group interactions, as well as on the identification components. Organizational communicativeness did not moderate the relationship between identifications and OCB, but was significantly positively correlated with both OCB dimensions. The theoretical and practical implications of the study findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on souring relations between Russia and Western countries and how Russian President Vladimir Putin's isolationism and anti-Western rhetoric may negatively impact Russian science. It states Russian research institutes and universities have started to instruct scientists to gain permission from the Federal Security Services prior to submitting papers or giving talks at scientific conferences. It mentions concerns of foreign-funded foundations they could be placed on a list of undesirable organizations.

The article focuses on the achievements of Vadim Mikhailovich Ivanov, doctor of chemistry and professor at the Division of Analytical Chemistry of Moscow State University in Russia, in the observance of his 70th birthday on July 16, 2006. Books written by Ivanov include the "Handbook of the Analytical Chemistry of Rare Elements." His research interests include the theory of action and applications of organic analytical reagents. Professor Ivanov's papers have received prizes from the Mendeleev Russian Chemical Society.

The author reflects on the scientific legacy of Russia, focusing on the how the Russian literature can stimulate new line of research by making it accessible to the international scientific community. It discusses topics including the 40th scientific assembly of the Committee on Space Research held at the Lomonosov Moscow State University in Moscow, university founder Mikhail Lomonosov, and a paper by Aggarwal and co-authors on groundwater discharge for degassing of radiogenic 4He .

The article presents information on the Advanced Papyrological Information System, a master catalog of more than 23,000 papyri--texts inscribed on paper made from flattened reeds--and other ancient writings. The artifacts reside at 10 institutions, including Columbia University and the State Hermitage Museum in Russia. Scrawled in 13 languages on everything from wooden tablets to banana leaves, the texts date back as far as the 2nd millennium B.C.E. More than half of them have digital images, and about one-fourth provide English translations.