The specifics of modern university practices in introducing students to traditional moral values: A problem-focused expert assessment

Introduction. The article is devoted to the problem of comprehension and evaluation of local practices of introducing students to traditional moral values as a productive response to modern axiological challenges and value-determined strategic tasks facing the national education system. The purpose of the research is to identify and describe certain features of modern experience of higher education institutions in introducing students to traditional moral values. Materials and Methods. The methodological basis of the study included systemic, axiological, and personal activity-based approaches. The scientific concepts of ‘Educational Systems’ and ‘Educational Space’ and ‘Phenomenology of Being’ and ‘Development of Personality’ are significant for the theoretical substantiation of the work carried out. The methods of expert evaluation, problem-focused analysis of the results of professionals’ project-analytical group work, systematization and generalization, including those based on a given algorithm, were used. The group work was organized within the framework of the II All-Russian Research Conference ‘Scientific bases for the implementation of state policy on the preservation and strengthening of traditional values through the system of moral educational work of higher education institutions’ (December 18, 2024, Moscow, Russian Academy of Education), the number of participants was 195. The expert function was performed by members of the Scientific Council on the problems of education of the younger generation at the Department of Philosophy of Education and Theoretical Pedagogy of the Russian Academy of Education and the staff of the Center for Education and Personal Development of the Russian Academy of Education (n=32).Results. The experts identified five key problems of introducing students to traditional moral values in higher education institutions: the potential of the educational process (content of academic disciplines, methods of organizing classes and practices) is not sufficiently used; the potential of the university environment (including electronic educational environment of the university, university media) is not fully actualized; teachers, invited professionals (employers), student self-government, student associations are involved to a limited extent; the university is not able to organize systematic work on introducing students to traditional moral values (the event approach prevails), to cover all the key values; there are no common criteria according to which it is possible to monitor the effectiveness of work on introducing students to traditional moral values (primarily qualitative, not quantitative). Generalized judgments as a result of group work are obtained using the algorithm of problem assessment: what are the main manifestations of the problem; what are the main causes of the problem; what are the predicted negative consequences of the persistence of this problem in the future; what universities are currently doing to overcome this problem; what help is needed for universities to overcome this problem; suggestions for changing the situation as a result of joint analysis of the problem and generalization of current experience. Conclusions. The authors identified characteristic features of the practices of introducing students to traditional moral values with the main focus on systemic, age-conditioned, content-meaningful, motivational-selective, environmental, evaluative and scientific-methodological aspects.