Ministry of Education wants to allow college graduates to teach at school

Subject teachers for Russian schools may be trained in colleges. Such an initiative was made by the head of the Ministry of Education, Sergei Kravtsov. Now, within the framework of secondary vocational education in the Russian Federation, only specialists are trained for kindergartens and primary schools. As Kommersant found out, the idea did not find unequivocal support in the pedagogical community. Experts believe that another attempt to get rid of the shortage of staff in regional schools will not be effective.

The fact that in Russia secondary school teachers (from the 5th to the 9th grade) will be trained in the system of secondary vocational education (SVE), said the head of the Ministry of Education, Sergei Kravtsov. “Currently, a draft federal state educational standard for secondary vocational education is being prepared to train subject teachers for basic schools,” Mr. Kravtsov announced at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. According to the current rules, SVE programs are designed only to train specialists for kindergartens and elementary schools, and subject teachers need to graduate from a university.

The press service of the Ministry of Education did not answer Kommersant’s questions about the details of the initiative. They only stated that the “federal state standard of secondary vocational education for teacher training” would be actively discussed with the professional community, school principals and representatives of regional authorities. The document, added in the department, will be sent for consideration to the Federal Educational and Methodological Association (FUMO).

Secondary vocational education programs are mentioned in the “List of occupations of workers and positions of employees for which vocational training is provided.” The current version of the document was adopted in 2013, and the Ministry of Education has repeatedly stated the need to revise the list. The new list is ready, but has not yet entered into force. The report of the government of the Russian Federation on the implementation of state policy in the field of education states that professions that “meet the modern requirements of the economy and the demands of the labor market, taking into account applications from employers” are included there. Mr. Kravtsov claims that graduates of pedagogical specialties of the secondary vocational education system are in great demand among employers – the management of schools and kindergartens.

It should be noted that representatives of the Ministry of Education in recent years have repeatedly complained about the shortage of teaching staff in the regions. According to the Center for the Economics of Lifelong Education, RANEPA, in 2021–2022, 3.1% of specialists were lacking in the Russian Federation (see Kommersant dated July 27, 2022). And the HSE Institute of Education pointed to an increase in the number of teachers of retirement and pre-retirement age, as young specialists do not go to work in the system.

The option in which teachers without higher education teach in a secondary school can only be considered as a temporary measure to “fill in personnel gaps in the field,” commented the chairman of the Education Commission of the Moscow City Duma, Honored Teacher of Russia Yevgeny Bunimovich, to Kommersant on the initiative of the Ministry of Education. Mr. Bunimovich, the author of mathematics textbooks for grades 5–9, is sure that teachers “need very high qualifications” in order to be able to correctly convey this knowledge: “If a college can provide this, then it’s time to make it a university.” Mr. Bunimovich noted that “in Moscow there are no problems with personnel and teachers have higher education.”

Chairman of the interregional trade union “Teacher” Vsevolod Lukhovitsky believes that “even if such programs (training teachers in colleges.— “b”) appear, there will be no qualitative and quantitative growth of the teaching community.” The teacher explained that “not only do young people not go to work in school, but those who already work there leave because of poor working conditions.” In itself, the idea of ​​secondary vocational education for subject students did not seem bad to Mr. Lukhovitsky. “There were very good technical schools in the USSR, where they trained, for example, teachers of the English language,” he noted, “but it doesn’t matter if there are colleges or universities, you can open a bunch of them – people still won’t go to work in school, so the measure ineffective.”

Polina Yachmennikova