Okhotny Ryad. Talk about important things

The State Duma, Okhotny Ryad, on Tuesday, September 13, opened the autumn session of 2022 with great concern. And then she took a big and serious step by adopting in the first reading a deputy bill on the gold standard of education called “On Amendments to the Federal Law” On Education in the Russian Federation “.

The discussion took over two hours. Minister of Education Sergei Kravtsov was invited. For almost the first time, he felt confident in a public role.

“The bill has been approved by the Ministry of Finance, it really will not require additional funds. And we will have about 200-300 textbooks from the amount you mentioned. And we have money for development, we will announce a competition, and the best teams of authors will give their applications, and we will select the best teams of authors,” the minister said in response to the deputies’ doubts.

The law was hurried to be adopted quickly, the second reading was scheduled for the next day.

According to the annotation to the draft law, it is envisaged to introduce federal basic general education programs (FOOP), uniform for the Russian Federation, which will be developed and approved by the Ministry of Education of Russia as a mandatory basic level of requirements for the content of general education.

Educational programs for preschool education will be developed and approved (in accordance with the federal state educational standard for preschool education) also taking into account the relevant federal educational program for preschool education (valid – the corresponding exemplary educational programs for preschool education). Organizations carrying out educational activities in accordance with state-accredited educational programs of primary general, basic general, secondary general education develop educational programs in accordance with federal state educational standards and the relevant FOOPs. The content and planned results of educational programs developed by educational organizations should not be lower than the corresponding content and planned results of the FOOP.

An organization carrying out educational activities in accordance with educational programs of basic general, secondary general education that have state accreditation, when developing an appropriate general education program, has the right to provide for the redistribution of the time provided for in the federal curriculum for the study of subjects for which state final certification is not carried out, in favor of studying other educational subjects, including the organization of in-depth study of individual subjects and specialized training.

The federal work programs of the subjects: “Russian language”, “Literary reading” and “The world around us” – in the implementation of the educational program of primary general education and “Russian language”, “Literature”, “History”, “Social studies”, “Geography” and “Fundamentals of Life Safety” – in the implementation of educational programs of basic general and secondary general education, as well as the federal work program of education and the federal calendar plan for educational work.

Authorized state authorities of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation are involved in the development of FOOPs (in terms of taking into account regional, national and ethno-cultural characteristics).

It also provides for the specifics of the preparation, examination, approbation and publication of textbooks and teaching aids developed in conjunction with them, which are allowed to be used in the implementation of relevant educational programs.

The Federal Law enters into force on the day of its official publication, with the exception of provisions for which a different date for their entry into force is established. There are transitional provisions.

If what is written in the bill can be implemented, this is a revolution, the reverse of the events of the nineties.

The objections of the opponents were related to the insufficiency of the introduced norms. To create a unified educational space, in addition to textbooks, it is necessary to finance the regions. The future law does not provide for additional funding.

Chairman of the Committee on Family, Women and Children, communist Nina Ostanina said: “Unfortunately, this is a law, well, as it sounded here today, it is not yet about a unified educational space, while this is a law on unified general education programs, because the space also implies and funding. In this regard, of course, the first step is welcome, moreover, it is what is called a social order for the parent community, and the pedagogical one.

Deputy Ostanina stressed that even the consolidated budget for education is two times less than the need for the modernization of education.

Oleg Smolin, a member of the Communist Party faction, formulated a sacred question: “All of us who have read school textbooks know that they are dramatically overcomplicated. Look, there simple things, such as participles or gerunds, are defined as in high school textbooks, and not at all for children. Will the task be set to simplify the form of presentation in order to make it more accessible to children, which will certainly improve the quality of knowledge?

Deputies from national republics frightened with uniformity and demanded unity of diversity. In particular, the right to wear a headscarf to school.

Member of the SRZP faction Yana Lantratova is outraged by the textbooks of Russian as a foreign language.

“I spoke at this podium, talking about the textbook of Russian as a foreign language, which is used in the educational process, which is, frankly, anti-state in nature. After my speech, I received a lot of letters from the parent community and from teachers who sent photos, print screens from Russian textbooks. I studied them very carefully, and I see that there are facts that are simply distorted, there are facts that contradict universal values ​​and morality, there are facts that contain anti-state and anti-Russian rhetoric.

And why is this happening? Because there were exemplary educational programs, which, by the way, were developed by the Ministry of Education, but they were purely advisory in nature, and then the regions and schools want to apply them, but they don’t want to apply them. And what’s going on? Any team of authors can apply to prepare a textbook,” Lantratova said.

Communist Nikolai Kolomeitsev is so dissatisfied with what happened in education that he does not believe in the success of the undertaking.

“Aristotle, the founder of higher education, said that if you want to have a thinking society, teach arithmetic, mathematics, and today you have mathematics textbooks, look, two geese flew, one gray, the other to the right, how old is the hedgehog, about such a task plan”, – said the furious communist.

Chairman Vyacheslav Volodin did not want to give the floor to Kolomeitsev, but could not resist the pressure.

Kolomeitsev cited the Donbass as an example: “You know, in the now recognized territories in the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, a year later, the problem of textbooks arose, and there our volunteers, who actively participated in the defense and then in the formation of these republics, they simply took elementary: they reprinted Soviet textbooks, you know. In the same place, everything was elementary simple, and there, not for some specific task, in order to win a tender, it was done, but was done so that the children would receive knowledge in the most understandable form: mother, frame, and so on, you understand.

The speaker, deputy chairman of the Duma Pyotr Tolstoy, gave even worse examples: “The parental community has long been paying attention to, to put it mildly, the dubious content of individual textbooks. In this bill, we want to exclude situations where a link to a porn site is found in an English textbook, Crimea appears on maps as part of Ukraine, the blockade of Leningrad is presented as a defense, and four pages are given to the entire history of the Great Patriotic War.

Tolstoy intends to leave tutors out of work: “when forming assignments for the OGE at the end of grade 9 and the Unified State Examination at the end of grade 11, only these federal programs will be taken into account.

What does this mean in practice for parents? You can refuse tutors, which are now needed, when children are taught one thing at school, and completely different questions are raised at the exam, which children did not go through in the school curriculum. We minimize the need to involve tutors. And, accordingly, the tasks must correspond to the topics of the standard.

Humanitarian items will be under special protection.

Pyotr Tolstoy explained the essence of the gold standard: “The proposed bill is just about that. We are considering in the first reading this law, as it is called “on the gold standard of knowledge”, it is aimed at creating a unified educational space in Russia, fulfilling the instructions of the President of Russia. For a number of subjects, unified federal educational programs should become mandatory. For elementary school – this is the Russian language, literary reading and the world around, for basic general and secondary general education – the Russian language, literature, history, social science and geography, the basics of life safety. As you can see, we are talking, first of all, about humanitarian subjects, about subjects that shape a person’s worldview.

We propose to exclude from the current legislation the concept of “exemplary program”, which allows methodologists and teachers not only to develop their own educational and methodological documentation, but sometimes to interpret certain topics too freely, to pay insufficient attention to their study. This is called “variability in the presentation of material”, we observe it in school textbooks and as a result – confusion in the minds of students. We have only a few dozen of these textbooks on the history of these textbooks.”

End of quote.

Both the authors-deputies and Minister Kravtsov pay special attention to education.

“The bill under consideration proposes the introduction of federal basic general education programs, which should be developed by the Ministry of Education of Russia, include a unified federal curriculum, a federal calendar curriculum, federal work programs for subjects, courses and disciplines, other components and a federal work program for education, a federal calendar plan of educational work,” said Tolstoy.

Kravtsov then added: “A very important question, Pyotr Olegovich said about this, that there will be a unified program of federal educational work, we already have it, as an example, and is based on those spiritual and moral principles that are reflected in the National Security Strategy approved by the President .

All issues related to spiritual and moral education – love for a small and large Motherland, respect for elders, for work – are set out in this program today. In connection with the adoption of the law, this program will operate in schools, and thus we will move away from the negative trends that you mentioned.

But I want to emphasize that in general education is not only an education system, but, first of all, it is a family. Education begins with the family and the formation of all psychological functions up to the age of seven, so we must work with parents, with the family, with the media, cinema, theater, here we work together with the Ministry of Culture, that is, this is such a systemic, integrated work. .

End of quote.

The minister postponed the most acute to the very end of the discussion.

“As for the content of textbooks, this is a very key issue. The question of a history textbook has been repeatedly raised in the State Duma. Right now, a special military operation is underway, and we will certainly include these issues. Just like in the subject that is now going on, talking about something important, when we talk about all the questions, goals and objectives of the special military operation set by the president, in every lesson, at every step for each student, we speak openly, we explain that there disinformation, that… those fakes that today seek to undermine our country and our schoolchildren. And, of course, the methods that exist today, we keep them, just like in the lessons – talking about important things, they can always change. What the child is interested in, what the teacher needs, we will, of course, preserve and increase all this for the benefit of our country,” Minister Kravtsov told the deputies.

Autumn sessions are short and intense. It is necessary to adopt the budget and there will also be cardinal changes. The Duma has planned for three months, nine government hours. Their format has shifted towards content, meaningfulness and responsibility.

Lev Moskovkin.