Employment of Phd Program Graduates in Russia
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Mironos et al. SpringerPlus (2015) 4:230 DOI 10.1186/s40064-015-1003-x a SpringerOpen Journal RESEARCH Open Access Employment of PhD program graduates in Russia: a study of the University of Nizhni Novgorod graduates’ careers Alexei A Mironos1*, Boris I Bednyi2 and Larisa A Ostapenko2 Abstract An analysis is presented of the employment of PhD program graduates of the State University of Nizhni Novgorod, one of Russia’s leading universities, from 2009 to 2013. We have studied the features of the career paths of graduates in different disciplines who specialized in natural sciences, social sciences and humanities. The lines of research are proposed for the further study of the issues of highly intellectual labor market development in Russia and employment of PhD program graduates. Keywords: Employment; Market of highly intellectual labor; PhD program; Surveys Introduction not all the problems have received equal attention. Al- One of the most visible expressions of globalization though the formation of the ideology of a new type of doc- processes taking place in the field of education is the toral education in the course of the Bologna process has Common European Higher Education Area (CEHEA) been the major focus of attention over the last decade, the that has been formed in Europe. The changes in the issues of adaptation in Russian universities of European higher education system are very extensive and multifa- models for organization of postgraduate training have not ceted. They affect not only the educational systems of been adequately explored (hereinafter in this text we will the leading European states, which initiated the Bologna consider the terms “postgraduate education”, “doctoral process in 1999, but also a much wider range of states education”, “level 6 of Tertiary education” used in Europe with significant specific features in the development of and the US as synonymous to the Russian term “post- their national educational systems. These specific fea- graduate studies” (“aspirantura”) and the Russian aca- tures are determined by several factors: the current level demic degree of Candidate of Sciences (“Kandidat nauk)” of social, economic, scientific and technological develop- as an analog of the PhD degree). Currently, a number of ment of these countries, the traditions of national higher researchers investigate individual problems of moder- education systems, the goals and objectives they plan to nizing Russian PhD programs in accordance with the achieve as the result of their integration in a unified Bologna principles. Thus, a comparative study of the im- European Higher Education Area. plementation of network PhD programs in Europe and The Russian Federation joined the Bologna Process in Russia was carried out (Artamonova et al. 2013). Some 2003. The analysis of the problems and results of the problems encountered in the course of introduction of Bologna approaches implementation in the Russian sys- structured training programs and the implementation of tem of higher education has been a continued focus of research schools as new institutional forms of doctoral attention of experts engaged in research in this area education in modern conditions in Russia were also exa- (see eg, Aydarova 2014; Mingaleva and Mirskikh 2012; mined (Bednyi 2013). Vahitov 2013; Senashenko 2013; Vvedensky 2013), however, It is essential for all countries participating in the modernization of their education systems in accordance * Correspondence: [email protected] with the Bologna recommendations to define specific 1Institute of International Relations and World History, Nizhni Novgorod State modernization measures (steps) with the account of the University, Ulyanov St. 2, Nizhni Novgorod, Russia data relating to the employment of graduates, their Full list of author information is available at the end of the article © 2015 Mironos et al.; licensee Springer. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. Mironos et al. SpringerPlus (2015) 4:230 Page 2 of 8 satisfaction with the level and content of the training re- in Russia. This also refers to highly qualified experts ceived during their period of studies. This approach is (Kirpichov 2011). A significant factor is the deepening dif- also consistent with the basic principles and objectives ferentiation between individual universities, which is sti- of the Bologna process, which include further improve- mulated by selective (competitive) support that universities ment of the quality and attractiveness of European receive from the government. Thus, the data on the higher education and ensuring successful employment of employment of graduates of postgraduate education pro- university graduates by means of labor market orienta- grams at different universities can vary significantly de- tion of all academic degrees and other qualifications. pending on the factors listed above. At the present stage of the study of this problem, it is important to outline the Problem statement typical objects for case study that can characterize trends Collection and analysis of data on the employment of in the labor market for graduates of postgraduate educa- university graduates is a relatively new and insufficiently tion programs. developed task in the framework of both the govern- In this study, the analysis is based on the employment ment (federal) and the departmental education statistics data of PhD program graduates of the Lobachevsky State of the Russian Federation. A comprehensive technique University of Nizhni Novgorod (UNN). UNN is one of for monitoring graduates’ employment developed on the the major classical provincial universities that ranks at initiative of the Ministry of Education and Science of the the top part of the national rankings of Russian univer- Russian Federation was tested in 2011 in 10 regions of sities. Over the last decade, it was the winner in many the Russian Federation and starting from 2012 it has competitions and participated in all major government been used in all the constituent entities of Russia (Serova programs to stimulate the development of higher edu- and Mazaeva 2013; Gurtov et al. 2014). However, under cation in Russia: in 2009, UNN received the status of this system of information gathering, no information National Research University, it is now participating concerning employment of PhD program graduates is (since 2013) in the program to improve the competitive- assembled and analyzed. Thus, at the present time there ness of Russian universities among the world’s leading are no representative data on this subject in Russia. Such research and education centers. The areas in which trai- data can be obtained only in the framework of large- ning is provided includes natural sciences, social sciences scale national and international studies similar to the and the humanities. Thus, the results obtained can in a project “Careers of Doctorate Holders” conducted by the certain way (partly) characterize the employment of gra- Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development duates of PhD programs of leading Russian universities in (OECD) and Eurostat (Auriol et al. 2013) or the Survey of the province. Doctorate Recipients conducted since 1973 by National Science Foundation (NSF), USA. (Survey of Doctorate Research methodology Recipients 2013). To obtain information about employment, graduates The objective of this study is to identify and analyze spe- who have completed postgraduate studies during the cific features of the employment of graduates of tertiary period from 2009 to 2013 were interviewed. In the education programs (postgraduate schools) of Russian course of the study, data were obtained on the “starting universities. This research should be viewed as an explo- period” of graduates’ employment, since the respon- ratory study designed to determine the most significant dents’ work record after graduation did not exceed features of PhD program graduates’ employment and to 5 years. The survey involved 431 respondents (81% of identify the most significant problems for future research. the total number of graduates in this category). The dis- tribution of respondents depending on the general areas Selection of the research object of postgraduate studies was as follows: exact and natu- In the study of employment of Russian universities’ PhD ral sciences and IT - 62%; humanities and social program graduates, one should take into account both sciences - 38%. the significant differences that exist between scientific Graduates who received training in natural sciences and educational level of individual Russian universities, and technology were represented as follows in respect- and the career paths of their graduates. There are many ive areas of knowledge: quite diverse factors affecting their employment pros- pects. Of great importance is the territorial location of physical and mathematical sciences – 48%, the University: thus, career prospects for graduates of uni- biological sciences – 22%, versities located in the capital and for graduates of pro- chemical sciences – 20%, vincial universities are different. This fact is not only and information technology (computer sciences, not so much due to the differences in the level of training, mathematical modeling, informatics and but also due to a relatively low level of territorial