Modern educational environment in the Russian Federation. A modern digital educational environment is being formed in Russia 

Today, in accordance with the law, online education is not an independent form of education, but a technology that no one prohibits educational institutions from using. For this reason, the heads of Russian universities, accustomed to working in conditions of regulation of everything, treat it with concern. The project “Modern Digital Educational Environment in the Russian Federation” (SDES) is designed to alleviate these concerns.

According to Yuri Belonozhkina, first vice-president of the organization “Professionals of Distance Learning”, founder of the training center EduCons.Online, in Russia there is still no state policy in the field of online education. “At the legislative level, it is generally illegal. There is only the right to use online technologies within the framework of traditional full-time and distance learning,” the expert says. “There are a lot of conditions behind this right that are not always relevant to online activities.” Thus, today our country is at a disadvantage compared to other countries. “It is necessary to mobilize scientific, professional, public and government resources to break this impasse,” he says.

Problems of Russiane-learning

A serious problem of today's online education is the lack of quality content that allows you to independently acquire knowledge. Online courses are created within individual educational institutions and are often kept behind closed doors. However, their quality often leaves much to be desired. According to Georgy Saatchyan, General Director of RFTekhno, the quality of distance learning programs directly depends on two conditions. On the one hand, the intellectual and pedagogical talent of their creators, as well as the cohesion of the team working on distance learning programs, play a decisive role. On the other hand, to achieve high quality of individual courses, and even more so of comprehensive educational programs, considerable funds are needed. “The cost of producing a course on Russian literature, based on reading, is significantly lower than the cost of a course on computer literacy, which is an interactive simulator,” the expert gives an example.

There are also aggregators that provide access to a wide variety of online courses. For example, the educational platform “Open Education”, created by the association “National Platform of Open Education”, the founders of which are Moscow State University, St. Petersburg Polytechnic University, St. Petersburg State University, MISiS, Higher School of Economics, MIPT, UrFU and ITMO. Member universities of the association and partner universities can post online courses on it. The quality of online courses is controlled, first of all, by the developer university itself. “The developer university itself necessarily has a quality control system for online courses and checks compliance with the requirements of the Open Education platform,” says Vasily Tretyakov, Chairman of the Board of the Association “National Open Education Platform”. “Online courses are constantly being refined and improved based on collected feedback from students and universities that include them in their educational programs.”

The issue of payment for the services of online course providers has not been resolved.

The issue of payment for the services of producers of online courses that will be used by schoolchildren and students in the learning process has not yet been resolved. The organization of online consultations between distance learners and teachers, such as a forum, Skype session, webinar or email correspondence, remains the responsibility of the educational institutions themselves. Also in the sphere of responsibility of educational organizations lies the remuneration of teachers.

According to Saatchyan, the problem of creating a network of joint testing centers in Russia, where distance learning students could take exams, remains unresolved. “In theory, a consortium of universities should pay for their existence. A student of any university must come to such a center with a passport, and the task of a technical worker is to verify his identity, put him in front of a computer with the Internet and make sure that the student does not use additional materials. The student himself logs into the desired system, takes the exam and leaves. This combines the modern form of education and the traditional approach to passing exams,” he clarifies.

How is SCOS useful?

The solution, which is planned to be implemented within the framework of the priority project “Modern digital educational environment in the Russian Federation,” will make it possible to collect on one Internet resource information about all high-quality online courses suitable for both formal and informal education. “It is planned that in 2017 a new Internet portal will appear that will unite online learning platforms. This will be a catalog of online courses that can be taken as part of a higher education program or a secondary vocational education program. For example, one of the online platforms whose courses will be presented on this portal will be “Open Education,” says Tretyakov.

Some of the online courses studied by applicants can be fully or partially transferred after admission to the university and not be studied again, explains Alexander Molchanov, Deputy Head of the Committee for Vocational Education and Personnel Training of Business Russia, Vice President of the ProObraz Company, Founder of the Professional Electronic Education Company, Coordinator of the Public and Business Council for Priority Projects in the Strategic Direction of Education. “Thus, the SCES will make it possible to create educational programs in regional universities, where students will take part of the disciplines online with the best teachers from the country’s leading universities,” continues Alla Noskova, founder of educational marketplaces postupi.online and edumarket.ru.

Some of the online courses studied can be transferred in whole or in part after entering the university.

Within the framework of the SCES, it is also planned to resolve the issue of compensating educational platforms for the tuition of students already enrolled in universities, if online courses were used as an elective discipline or were built into the educational process. Currently, this is solved by the network form of implementation of educational programs in accordance with Article 15 of the Education Law.

First steps towards universal distance learning

Today, the Ministry of Education and Science is working on the formation of the regulatory framework necessary to create a modern digital educational environment in Russia. Several legislative acts have already been amended, some are still being approved. In particular, the order of the Ministry of Education and Science dated April 5, 2017 No. 301 “On approval of the Procedure for organizing and implementing educational activities in educational programs of higher education - bachelor’s degree programs, specialty programs, master’s programs” was newly developed.

An updated version of the procedure for using e-learning and distance learning technologies by organizations engaged in educational activities in the implementation of educational programs will soon be released. Methodological recommendations for the use of online courses are being prepared. The issues of legalizing virtual academic mobility and many others are also discussed.

Work on the project is taking place behind closed doors.

“Unfortunately, the main conditions are not visible in the SCOS - support for developers and promotion of the online courses themselves. But all efforts are focused on regulating online learning,” says Yuri Belonozhkin. – As a result, we will see the conservation of those approaches to online learning that were in place yesterday. And the emergence of new solutions will require constant refinement of norms and rules.” A significant drawback of the work on the project is also that it takes place behind closed doors, which, according to the expert, contradicts the principles of openness and competition in protecting the results of scientific activity.

“Even in the current configuration, in conditions of high independence of educational organizations, we have a sufficient regulatory framework for the development of online learning,” Alexander Molchanov disagrees with him. “Difficulties usually arise at the intersection of the state and non-state sectors, as well as in matters of financial relationships between state educational organizations and educational platforms.” In his opinion, lists of best practices and recommendations from leading organizations in the field of online learning, such as Universarium, Lectorium, National Platform of Open Education, their experience of working with educational organizations, as well as active work could help here associations in the field of e-learning development, such as “Electronic Education of the Republic of Bashkortostan” or Omsk Regional Electronic University.

“It is important for the state that the basic principles laid down in federal legislation are observed, and that high-quality regulations exist within the university itself,” the expert sums up. – Unfortunately, the fear of inspections in the context of the constant reduction of universities leads to a state of stagnation in the field of launching new educational projects. This is stagnation not only in online education, but also in the development of network forms of implementing educational programs together with employers, and in the development of entrepreneurial universities with diplomas in the form of startups and many others.”

What are the main tasks that the project “Modern digital educational environment in the Russian Federation” should solve and what is the essence of the digital educational environment? How significant are the upcoming changes and why is the project highlighted as a priority? It is these questions that we will try to address in this article.

Global changes in the Russian education system continue. In particular, the decrees of the President of the Russian Federation, which he signed in May 2018, affected the transformation of the system in the field of digital technologies. Despite the fact that Russian education has remained competitive in the global market for many years, the country’s leadership decided to complicate the task by introducing the project “Modern digital educational environment in the Russian Federation.” The implementation and systematization of this priority project should be at full capacity already in 2024. Therefore, the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Science and Higher Education need to work as quickly and harmoniously as possible.

The relevance of introducing a digital educational environment Statistics show that due to global mechanization and automation, about 600 professions disappeared in the 20th century. In the 21st century, the situation has not changed - digital technologies, which are now being introduced into almost all spheres of human activity, continue to rapidly consign entire groups of professions and crafts to history. And those professions that have not disappeared have undergone/are undergoing significant changes. Naturally, digital technologies influence not only the level of development of the state’s economy and its defense capability, but also, ultimately, global political processes. Therefore, the state and society need specialists capable of managing complex equipment, instruments and robots in order to remain competitive at the global level. “Educating” such specialists who are able to “keep up” with constantly improving modern technologies is possible only under one condition: if their learning with the help of digital technologies begins almost from the cradle, and continues throughout their lives. Modern teenagers themselves are already actively using digital technologies to update their acquired knowledge and apply it in practice. But, unfortunately, independent acquisition of knowledge does not make it possible to obtain a certificate and present it to the employer. And it is also difficult to check the quality of this knowledge without an organized digital system in order to issue an appropriate diploma (even if a person has diligently engaged in self-education and his knowledge can be put to worthy use). Another problem of the educational system is the lack of a close relationship between specialized universities/vocational educational institutions and future employers and research centers. The digital system is capable of bringing all stakeholders in the advanced educational environment to a common denominator. In turn, such coordination is guaranteed to ensure economic growth and development of the state. This means that interest in the formation of a modern digital educational environment is dictated by time and state necessity.

Everyone needs MOOCs. Online courses and video lectures, which appeared in the 90s of the last century, did not provide feedback from the teacher, and, therefore, did not provide the opportunity to control and evaluate knowledge. This opportunity arose less than ten years ago. Interactive communication between teachers and students guarantees the quality of education and provides educational organizations with a regulatory framework for its certification. The need to combine all of these factors led to the idea of ​​​​creating a MOOC - a “Massive Open Online Course”. The created MOOC system allows you to solve the most significant problems:

Mass training; Availability; Obtaining a certificate or diploma from any educational institution, anywhere in the world without the need for personal presence, without interruption from work, main place of study, temporary relocation, etc.

In addition, the MOOC system makes it possible to solve the problem of replacing teachers, which arose due to a lack of personnel and the desire of students to study at the most prestigious universities in the country, without the need to move to another city.

By the way, until recently, online platforms were widely used for education only in the United States. However, in 2012, projects similar to the Udemy, Coursera and Udacity systems spread massively throughout the world. To a greater extent, this form of education was used by commercial educational institutions.

It should be noted that the digital educational environment, which, thanks to the light hand of analysts of the industry portal Inside Higher Ed, has been given the name “the era of EdTech optimism”, has made a real revolution in the conservative education system. Today it is a necessary element of education, ensuring the proper level in a modern developed state. Therefore, digital learning, by decree of the President of the Russian Federation, has become a priority task for government institutions in the first place. The state's interest in a new form of education is an absolute guarantee of its support and success.

Modern digital educational system in Russia Despite the fact that the leadership in creating a digital educational environment belongs to the United States of America, Russia lags only slightly behind in this area and is among the top five. In 2015, the National Platform for Open Education was created - OPEO, which operates on the basis of the best universities in Russia:

Today, the sites of these universities offer more than 300 online training courses in a variety of industry areas. “Virtual academic mobility” has so far had one significant drawback - the lack of a legal framework that can be organized and ensured with state support. The “Modern Digital Educational Environment” project solves this problem almost completely.

The passport for the priority project “Modern digital educational environment” was developed in October 2016 by the Presidium of the Council under the President of the Russian Federation. Now interested investors are being attracted to develop the created resource. An important issue remains the widespread introduction of digital education and a complete transition to a modern learning model.

Minutes of the meeting of the Presidium of the Council under the President of the Russian Federation for Strategic Development and Priority Projects dated October 25, 2016 No. 9 approved the passport of the priority project “Modern digital educational environment in the Russian Federation.” The inclusion of a priority project to create a digital educational environment in the portfolio of the Government of the Russian Federation demonstrates the importance of tasks for the development of new educational technologies.

Project passport

Objective of the project By 2018, create conditions for systematically improving the quality and expanding opportunities for lifelong education for all categories of citizens through the development of the Russian digital educational space and increasingthe number of students in educational institutions who have completed online courses up to 11 million people by the end of 2025.

Project Description

The priority project “Modern digital educational environment in Russia” is aimed at creating opportunities for citizens of different ages and social status to receive quality education using modern information technologies.

The implementation of the priority project should lead to the following results:

1. Creation of a system for assessing the quality of online courses and online resources of general education, combining automatic and expert assessment and providing students and educational organizations with reliable information about the quality of online courses and online resources.

2. Creation of an information resource (portal) accessible to all categories of citizens and providing for each user, on a “one-stop-shop” basis, access to online courses for all levels of education and online resources for mastering general education subjects, developed and implemented by different organizations on different platforms online learning.

3. Integration of the portal with the Unified Identification and Authentication System and the GIS “Contingent”, which ensures the storage and electronic transmission of information about educational achievements (formation of a digital portfolio) of a student between educational organizations.

4. Creation of open source software that improves the quality of online learning and reliable assessment of the results of mastering online courses.

5. Adoption of regulations allowing the development of online courses as part of basic and additional educational programs.

6. Creation of open online courses in the field of educational technologies and regional centers of competence in the field of online learning, providing training for employees of educational organizations at all levels in order to widely use online courses to improve the quality of educational programs.

7. Creation and implementation of at least 3,500 online courses, the results of which can be counted in basic educational programs.

Implemented activities

The project is being implemented in 4 stages and will be completed in November 2025. Activities of the priority project are carried out in accordance with the consolidated project plan approved by the project committee for the main direction of strategic development of the Russian Federation “Education”. Particularly significant project events, as well as documents and materials being developed within the project, will be regularly announced and published on the page

Achieving the above set of results will reduce the risks of investing in the creation of online courses, involve a wide range of participants, educational and other organizations, private investors, authors in the creation of online courses, to create and support online courses and online resources for mastering general education subjects attract funds from educational organizations, private investors, interested executive authorities of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation. Increasing the number of available courses, increasing the efficiency of online learning, and expanding opportunities for mastering online courses in the formal education system will allow us to achieve a more than 300-fold increase in the number of students taking online courses by 2025.

Technological conditions (domestic software). In parallel, various platforms and services are being developed that help improve the quality of online learning, which can be integrated into the general digital educational environment, which is facilitated by the availability of information standards for integration with information systems of educational organizations, requirements for the use of uniform means of identification and authentication of students and standard software solutions with open source codes that provide reliable assessment of learning outcomes (including monitoring the completion of the procedure for assessing learning outcomes), transfer of reliable learning results to electronic information and educational environments of universities, various types of communication between students, implementation of simulators, simulators, virtual laboratories, project work and so on.

Organizational, financial and legal conditions. The principle of freedom of choice of online courses by educational organizations or students provides motivation for educational organizations to develop and support high-quality and popular online courses at the expense of their own or borrowed funds. In the formal education system, online courses are used to master basic professional educational programs and additional professional education. In the non-formal education system, created online courses provide free access to knowledge and competencies from the best teachers in the country, lifelong learning, self-determination and professional guidance of students, and identification of talented children.

System for assessing the quality of online courses. The created system for assessing the quality of online courses will ensure a constant improvement in the quality of online courses while maintaining competition in the online learning market and involving a wide range of participants. The presence of a quality assessment system and the potential for return on investment will attract business and employers, which will allow citizens to gain access to new, in-demand competencies and promote successful employment. Personnel conditions. The result of the project will be the creation of conditions for the continuous development of competencies of teachers and specialists. Online courses will be used as part of individual training paths for teachers and specialists. Experience in developing and using online courses will be exchanged on an ongoing basis.

Alla Noskova, founder and CEO of Postupi.online, edumarket.ru, eduhh.ru, took part in the design and analytical session of the priority project “Modern Digital Educational Environment in the Russian Federation” (SDES).” She tried to figure out what this project brings to the business community to a greater extent: threats or opportunities.

What is the state doing in the edutech sector?

The information that appeared in various sources was contradictory and could create the impression that the state plans to strictly regulate the online education industry. Such regulation may ultimately render commercial investment in this industry pointless. In the coming year alone, the state will allocate 1.2 billion rubles for the implementation of this project.

Public documents of this project (the modern digital educational environment in the Russian Federation) mention the creation of regulatory support for the development of online learning, the creation of a system for assessing the quality of online courses, the creation of government services and integration solutions - a “One Window” resource.

What is the scope of this project?

First of all, the project “Modern Digital Educational Environment in the Russian Federation” (SDES) concerns formal education.

The executor of this project is the Department of State Policy in the Sphere of Higher Education of the Ministry of Education and Science of Russia, and therefore in the coming year the main focus of the project is higher education.

There is no clarity with school, vocational and additional vocational education. However, the mechanisms tested in higher education can then be used at other levels of formal education.

The project does not yet affect non-formal and informal education.

Why is the legal framework for the development of online learning being created?

The main goal is to create conditions where an online course can be enrolled in higher education programs. At the same time, legal and financial relations are implemented between organizations that are the owners of the online course and educational organizations that use the online course as part of their educational programs.

Currently, many barriers arise in this area, which prevents the widespread implementation of the practice of integrating online courses into higher education programs.

The development of regulatory support will allow universities and students to easily form individual educational trajectories, use online courses with the involvement of the best teachers and best practices, which will significantly improve the quality of higher education, especially in “second and third tier” universities.

Thanks to this regulatory framework, higher education systems will be able to offer their online courses and commercial services, such as Uniweb, Netology, Stepik, GeekBrains and others.

Of course, the basis for this possibility will be compliance with certain quality standards. In this sense, students will have the opportunity to acquire knowledge not only from the best teachers, but also to master the skills of the best practitioners in economic sectors.

What is the point of creating a system for assessing the quality of online courses?

In order for an online course to be integrated into the formal education system, it must meet certain quality criteria. These criteria have not yet been finalized. This, in fact, is part of the SCOS project. Obviously, they should differ for different levels of education.

Also, evaluation mechanisms have not been fully defined. It is expected that there will be several levels of assessment. The online course will be evaluated by experts, the students themselves, and, possibly, employers. However, in the situation of higher education, when an online course is only a component of the educational program, evaluation by employers is difficult.

The task of the SCES is to build a system for assessing the quality of online courses that will not require significant resources for assessment, while guaranteeing the quality of courses and the possibility of their development.

Why do you need a “Single Window” resource, what functions does it have?

At first, the developers of the SCOS project heard such analogies as booking.com, they called the “One Window” resource an aggregator and marketplace, they also saw the course pages on the “One Window” resource as marketing descriptions and landing pages.

One got the impression that the state wants to establish a hard (and possibly expensive) entrance to the sales of online courses, to create an online store of courses, on the shelves of which only the “chosen ones” will be able to get on.

However, when working in the group, it turned out that this is not at all about the state appropriating the right to sell high-quality online courses. There are conceptual problems here, when the business community and the developers of the SCOS project understand the terms differently.

What functions will the “Single Window” resource have?

• To create a basis for academic mobility, building an individual educational trajectory, and improving the quality of education in general, it is necessary to provide opportunities for comparison and selection of online courses according to various criteria and indicators. To achieve this, a registry of online courses must be created.
• Each course should have a standardized set of attributes that allows you to select it based on quality, rating, competencies that it develops, statistics, and so on. The online course must also have a minimum description that allows you to understand its essence.
• The next function of the “Single Window” resource is the accumulation and storage of data about online courses and those who completed them and received the corresponding certificate. As an element of public services, the “One Window” resource must ensure the reliability of storing such information and the possibility of its use by universities, employers and other interested parties.
• Data about those who completed the online course, electronic documents about completing the course can also be linked with other government information systems, for example, the GIS “Contingent”. The “Single Window” resource should provide opportunities for such integration.
• An important role of the “Single Window” resource is user identification, creation of subsystems, customized interfaces for all participants of the centralized communication system for their goals and objectives. The users of such a system will be universities, LMS systems, online course developers, students and trainees, customers, and so on.
• It is assumed that educational services, platforms, and universities will be able to have a single accounting space. A student user, having a universal identifier, will be able to log in with it both on the “Single Window” resource and in the LMS system where the online course will take place. Perhaps the proctoring function will also be built into the “Single Window” resource.

Will the One Stop Shop resource have a marketing function?

This is not the purpose of this resource, but rather one of its indirect “outputs”. Of course, organizations and commercial developers of online courses that will receive the status of partners whose online courses will be built into the formal education system will receive an additional impetus to develop their brand and stimulate sales.

They will also receive an additional source of funds through the sale of their educational products within the framework of the SCES.

The SCOS and the “One Window” resource will have a PR and promotion system. And in this sense, SCOS partners will receive brand strengthening and sales stimulation for their products. However, the pages of online courses of the “One Window” resource will not be classic landing pages. They will contain standardized summary information and will direct you to a detailed description of the course on the source resource.

Is there any government funding planned for the creation of online courses?

There are no plans for such funding at this time. It is assumed that the SCES project creates conditions for increasing the interest of universities and the business community in creating online courses and stimulates the online education market as a whole.

What will the online education market in Russia ultimately gain?

The modern digital educational environment in the Russian Federation creates amazing opportunities for all participants in the online education market, including commercial platforms that create online courses. They will be able to create online courses that, if they meet the quality criteria of the SCES, can be integrated into higher education programs and other formal education programs.

This should encourage developers to create online courses that are in demand by the education system. The authors of the SCES project plan that in 2025, 11 million people in Russia will take online courses posted on the “One Window” resource.