News in Press-centre

Vladivostok, January 20^th, “Ostrov.ru” newspaper. The defense of the University development projects, which were devised during educational trainings of FEFU managerial staff in Moscow Management School in Skolkovo, have been passed in FEFU recently. They are designed to make the University a more modern and effective, within the framework of FEFU Development Program, and to increase its competitiveness. The closest to implementation among six projects is FEFU Core Education project, or Freshman Year project, which will significantly change the lives of our students and the whole University.

Its developers tell “Ostrov.ru” newspaper about the project.

"The objective of our work in Skolkovo was to find for FEFU its identity in modern education, to offer our university what would bring it to a qualitatively new level," said Vladimir Pavlovsky, the Deputy Director for Development of the School of Arts, Culture and Sports. "We need to find a new educational paradigm and on its basis to form a new education. Our group consisted of the deputy directors for development of the schools of socio-humanitarian profile: Piotr Kuznetsov (School of Economics and Management), Olesya Bubnovskaya (School of Humanities), Roman Dremlyuga (Law School), Alina Karelina (Oriental Institute–School of Regional and International Studies), and Irina Turuntaeva (School of Education). As a result, we have developed the educational project for the formation of competencies of the human of a new type who can adapt to any society, be included in the right groups, hold leadership positions, plan and implement their ideas. We decided to call the project FEFU Core Education—the central, basic, main part of the educational process, which students are learning during the first year of study.

 

FEFU Core Education project defense. Piotr Kuznetsov (right photo)

- To what extent are such changes necessary?

"As you know, FEFU aims to become one of the leading universities in the Asia-Pacific Region,"  says Vladimir Pavlovsky. "To do this we have to work at an appropriate level: to provide a competitive education, to be well-known and unique in its own way. Therefore, renewals are needed. For example, for most people in our country, the higher education is synonymous with the profession. This is no longer valid for anywhere in the world. Profession is a skill, a set of skills. And for the last century we have trained people to follow professional templates. What was the result? Most of the graduates are not working according their major discipline, many are forced to change their profession and it incurs great losses—mental, physical and time consuming. It is unacceptable in our time of rapid changes.

The main purpose of a person in modern life is not to get a profession but self-realization and success. In all communities the person receiving the education to be successful in the future is forced to acquire additionally so-called meta-competencies: the ability to think critically, make decisions, to speak well and articulate her/his thoughts, to understand what is happening around, to be able to search for and analyze information. It does not matter whether you have received an education in Engineering, Natural Sciences or Humanities. This is something that any modern education is built around. To be successful in society, work in a team or lead it, you need such meta-competencies.

It is also important to note that the majority of students do not really understand what they want to be. This is the problem of students worldwide. Western education already a hundred years ago was puzzled by the question: how to give a student the education that will be really useful for her/him, how to spend her/his student years for the benefit and her/his future? And their option was offered. Now Anglo-Saxon education system is built on the principle that a student enrolls and picks two components: a Major, which is the main discipline (a physicist, biologist, historian, etc.) and a Minor, what we conventionally call specialization. Having studied Western colleagues’ experience, we proposed our project. It will help our students to define their directions, to acquire necessary set of meta-competencies and to finish the Young Student course."

"It should be noted that we are talking about higher education. And what is it?", says Piotr Kuznetsov. "There is a professional education and it copes with its tasks. But why is there a higher education, if it differs from the secondary one by study time only? It is clear that the higher education should be qualitatively different from the secondary professional one. Secondary education gives the profession. The higher education changes people. Everywhere in the world higher education is aimed at preparing people for achieving success in society. For example, you can take courses in accounting and in 20 years to become a highly demanded finance director. And you can get a degree in economics, that will change your mind, show you the international experience in this field, will teach you how to search for information, analyze, and such higher education will lead you to the position of finance director in 10 years."

- How will the lives of students be changed with the adoption of innovations?

"Traditionally we teach general disciplines for freshman students," says Piotr Kuznetsov. "Core project stipulates that instead of sketchy learning of a number of disciplines we focus on living and gaining knowledge experience—physical, philosophical, etc. Freshmen must develop their own conscious image of what actually is the modern professional area of their choice (Mathematics, Psychology, Biology, Engineering, etc.). It is assumed that one of the main activities within the framework of Core will be project work for the student to understand immediately what the work in industry or organization means, how to conduct research and to organize the work—personal one and of the project team, how to present and use the project results.

The most important thing in the first year of study is to lay the basis on which students will be able to learn and develop further on their own, to introduce students to the "self-learning" mode. A set of disciplines will be introduced under the title "Functional Literacy" (advanced study of languages, IT-technologies, financial and legal literacy, creative disciplines). While studying these disciplines the student will receive necessary practical, applied knowledge. A set of "Introduction to the Asia-Pacific Region" will be added for the students to get acquainted with the realities of the region in which they are studying and for FEFU to strengthen its special status as one of the leading universities of the Asia-Pacific Region. Physical education will also be taught in a new way, because it is through physical activity and team sports the leadership and communication skills are developed and formed. All this raises a number of requirements to the personality and competence of the teacher, to the forms of training organization and what is important to the student herself/himself.

The classic proportions of independent and classroom work will change. Now it is divided roughly in half. From now on a much greater emphasis will be placed on the organization of the students’ independent work and on checking of what students achieved. Students will become familiar with MOOC—massive open online courses of the leading universities of the world and FEFU own developments in this area. Taking of MOOC will be mandatory, but will be conducted out of classroom time. A new, special type of teachers will be required. There will be supervisors of independent work who will answer students' questions, check their work, involve them in discussion, and tutors, tracking individual success or failure of students. We shall approach to the training of tutors with great care and shall actively involve Master's Degree students in this work. After all, the creation of a new educational paradigm is not limited to one year.

Here is how it is made abroad. About once a month students listen "star" lectures. Real leaders in a particular field of study—researchers with international experience, social activists—lecture on any relevant topic for the audience of 400–500 people. Each week the students have teach-in classes where they discuss, learn to present their views, arguments when they agree or not agree with the views of others. In addition they are working on a problem or project. They first plunge into action and then choose for themselves some particular issue in focus, in respect of which they have to decide something during the first year of study. They actually initiate, plan and implement a specific project directly connected with the university, island, city, region.

It turns out that every FEFU freshman will be involved in the overall program, aimed at the formation of basic educational competencies and getting experience in independent acquisition of knowledge. She/he reads a lot, writes a lot, spends a lot of time on the on-line courses, debates, listens to "star" lectures, and implements the project that seems important to her/him. This is the way education is organized through the prism of student’s personal experience. It’s a kind of a global educational quest."

- When will these changes be implemented?

"We shall not be able to introduce this system to all students at once. This will happen gradually,"  says Vladimir Pavlovsky. "We have already rebuilt the English language course in FEFU, where groups are separated not by the specialization but by the level of language proficiency. The same it is with physical training. We believe that in the 2016/2017 academic year a number of courses in Core format will be prepared and launched, the training of special teachers who will supervise students' independent work shall be carried out. At the same time work will be done to build the database of tasks that students will tackle during their studies. Starting from 2018 Core will supposedly be launched in full. Among the first to put this system into operation will be the School of Humanities, School of Arts, Culture and Sports and the School of Economics and Management.

These changes may seem too bold and perhaps risky. But we need to develop. FEFU made a commitment to become a university of international standing and we must accomplish this goal. We have a compelling example nearby. This is China and Korea, where education is developing rapidly. Now the share of Asia-Pacific universities in the top 100 QS Rankings is growing annually. This is due to they have successfully modernized and borrow the experience of leading universities in the world. And you may not move with the speed of the flow in this race, you need to overtake it."