Many prestigious Russian colleges acknowledged as ineffective, some may be shut down

By Lyudmila Alexandrova, ITAR-TASS. Many believe that the evaluation criteria were wrong and that the results of the check did not reflect the real situation. A veritable tempest broke out in Russian higher education, as the Ministry of Education and Science said a considerable portion of state-run colleges was ineffective. Although it is not the final verdict, the Ministry of Education and Science does not deny that some ineffective colleges might be shut down. The staff and students of the ‘black-marked’ colleges are alarmed, as are their future entrants. Many believe that the evaluation criteria were wrong and that the results of the check did not reflect the real situation.
Last week, the Ministry of Education and Science announced that a number of colleges and their branches did not conform to the modern education standards. There are 136 of 541 state-run colleges and 450 of 994 branches on the "black list." The most intriguing is the fact that a majority of the blacklisted colleges are generally regarded as successful and prestigious. There are 20 such institutions in Moscow, and ten in St Petersburg. They include the Russian State University for the Humanities /RGGU/, the Maxim Gorky Literature Institute, the Moscow Architecture Institute /MARKhI/, and the Moscow State Academy of Physical Culture. Read More...