School principals and University rectors have discussed a mega-project to create a unified educational environment with the Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin during the round table which was held in the Lyceum №1560. The city plans to integrate basic, professional and additional education.

“Last year we made the first attempts in this direction: we established the first engineering and medical classes. This year there is already such a large-scale project involving hundreds of schools in Moscow, dozens of high school students. A few years ago it was impossible to think about this project, but today it is becoming quite real,” said Sergey Sobyanin.

According to him, now almost every school offers a few training profiles to choose from to high school students. “We used to have one or two 11th grades at schools. Today there are four and five classes, which allow to work in different areas, not only humanitarian and technical, but others, as I said before: medical, military, engineering as well as “Kurchatov project” and a number of other directions,” said the Mayor.

He expressed his gratitude to institutions of higher education and colleges, which have started to cooperate with schools of the city. “I think it's very important for the children themselves: get real guidance, understand what profession they are choosing — it is the basis of their future life, gain practical knowledge at enterprises and in the industrial parks of the city of Moscow. And of course it is important for universities: to get young people who are determined to study and know where they are going. And of course, it is extremely important for the city,” said Sergey Sobyanin.

This year there will be the first graduates of the engineering and medical classes, said the Minister of Moscow Government, head of the Education Department Isaak Kalina during the roundtable. According to him, this will complete the first phase of the project. “Today our task is not so much quantitatively to expand the project as efficiently combine the capabilities of universities, business interests and our opportunities,” he said.

The rector of the National Research Nuclear University “MEPhI” Mikhail Strikhanov expressed his suggestions about the project. He believes that it is necessary to increase the number of points in the portfolio of schoolchildren from engineering classes. This will help them to compete with other applicants for being admitted to universities. In addition, he suggested combining medical and engineering classes into classes of medical engineering. “I think the entrance competition will be very high. We have a special Institute of engineering physics for biomedicine in our University, and the last year competition has surpassed all expectations,” said Mikhail Strikhanov.

The mega-project to create a unified pre-professional environment was initiated in 2016. Its main goal is to provide each student with the opportunity to develop skills and abilities needed for the future profession, gain valuable professional qualification of medium level or in-depth knowledge that will be useful during training in high school.

Integration of pre-professional education is conducted by schools, which work in partnership with universities, industrial enterprises, research institutes, technology parks, museums and other organizations in the capital.

Now the program involves 148 schools, 16 universities and more than 100 high-tech enterprises (State Corporation Rosatom, Military Industrial Corporation “Scientific and production association of machine building”, energy holding RusHydro, Russian aircraft corporation MiG and others).

Full text on the Official site of the Moscow Mayor (in Russian)