Translartion. Region: Russians Fedetion –
Source: State University Higher School of Economics – State University Higher School of Economics –
Universities have always been considered as something more than just a place for training personnel. In each historical period, they were given different goals, and different requirements were imposed depending on the stage of development of the country and society. What the university of the future should be like and how to build a youth policy in it were discussed by representatives of more than 40 universities from all over the country at a strategic session that took place at the National Research University Higher School of Economics on April 11–12.
In recent years, the concept of youth policy has been undergoing a transformation: today, its tasks in universities are not just to provide leisure time for young people, but to fully and comprehensively develop their personality. Universities are beginning to work on building unified ecosystems of youth policy, in which each student can be unique and have their own development trajectory. At the same time, institutional support for the youth policy sphere is also in need of modernization. How to set up a system of grant competitions with a focus on supporting long-term systemic projects? How to understand students’ requests and build response support measures?
At the opening of the strategic session, the head of Rosmolodezh Grigory Gurov spoke about the priorities of youth policy and the opportunities provided by the department, and also recalled the advantages of the grant competition. “Grants are not just funds for the implementation of a project. This is an opportunity to get acquainted with the work of state and public institutions, this is a protected opportunity to implement your project, bring public benefit, and gain competencies,” he emphasized.
Deputy Minister of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation Olga Petrova thanked her colleagues from Rosmolodezh and the Higher School of Economics, emphasizing the importance of creating a unified system of work with young people. “Do not be afraid to interact with each other in your projects, within the subject, take into account inter-university collaborations. We are strengthening our common unified system of students, the implementation of youth policy among students, using all the tools and mechanisms that exist,” she said, welcoming the participants of the event.
HSE Vice-Rector Dmitry Zemtsov, one of the ideologists of the strategic session, delivered the opening lecture-challenge “Students’ Dreams and the University Mission”. He noted that universities have always implemented the mission of social development, but at each historical stage and in each state they understood it differently. According to him, today there is a certain crisis of this concept, the issue is relevant for the entire global scientific community, at the same time it opens up opportunities for the transition to evidence-based youth policy, in which decision-making and development of measures are based on data and research.
Director Institute of Education HSE University Evgeny Terentyev presented the results of a large-scale empirical study conducted by HSE together with 12 other Russian universities over the past three years. Scientists identified first-year students’ attitudes towards the role of higher education, their perception of its value, and their expectations of learning.
The strategy session also included lectures by the chief research fellow Project-training laboratory “Youth policy” HSE Alexey Tokarev “The Image of the Future in the Mass Consciousness of Young People: Applied Sociology”, Director of the Resource Center of Rosmolodezh Pavel Khlopin “Modern Challenges of Education in the Sphere of Education”, Director Center for Sociology of Higher Education HSE Ivan Gruzdev “What young people are silent about and how can we find out about it” and others.
The first day of the strategic session ended with the business game “Grad Kitezh”, the main objective of which was to demonstrate to the participants the importance of keeping the key goal and mission of their activities in focus. Having reflected on the results of the game, on the second day the teams spoke at a pitch session with a presentation of the best university solutions in the field of youth policy.
Summing up the results of the strategic session, HSE expert Alexandrina Klyus and HSE Deputy Vice-Rector Ilya Yaskov called on students to treat their studies at the university as a very important job that serves the benefit of not only the university and the region, but the entire country. “Universities are always on the frontier, they really are the drivers of development, it is at the university that knowledge is born, which is then transformed into production and economic growth,” Ilya Yaskov summed up.
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