The Crisis of Postgraduate Studies in Russia: What Bears Problems and How to Overcome Them

The article attempts to analyse the current situation in training scientific and pedagogical personnel, as well as certain reasons for the low indicators of candidate-of-sciences theses defended in recent years. There are analyzed the state and dynamics of the system of postgraduate training in the post-Soviet period, including changes that came into force in 2013 and 2014 - those of assigning an educational status to postgraduate studies and of increasing requirements imposed on applicants of academic degrees. It is discussed how these changes fit the global context of postgraduate education development, whether they can be considered an explanation for the decrease of theses defences. The article proves that the negative trends observed today in the sphere of scientific and pedagogical personnel training are determined by the processes occurring in higher education and science in the post-Soviet period and by the problems arisen as a result of these processes. The empirical base of the research is a survey of 1,866 graduate students in 11 Russian universities participating in Project 5-100, as well as semi-structured interviews with 20 graduate students and 11 university staff responsible for the implementation of graduate programmes. The key problems of the Russian postgraduate studies identified on the basis of the empirical study are the following: (1) poor quality of enrollment; (2) poor quality of scientific advisory; (3) insufficient financial support of postgraduates. The article suggests possible steps to overcome these problems.