On 6th July 2011, the Education Council held one of its regular meetings to discuss the modernization programme for the general education system, initiated by the Chairman of the Government V.V.Putin. As usual, the Council met in the main library of Moscow State University, and the Council members were joined by Igor Mikhaylovich Remorenko, the Deputy Minister of Education, Nikolay Ivanovich Bulaev, a member of the State Duma Science Committee, Galina Ivanovna Merkulova, Chairman of the All-Russian Education Trade Union, and other experts, including lots of guests from the regions, who also played an active part in the debate. The modernization programme coordinators, Nikolay Bulaev and Igor Remorenko, spoke about its aims and objectives and how it is being implemented, covering issues such as funding, allocation of funds between the regions and monitoring of results. One of the most hotly debated issues of this modernization programme to date has been the salary rises for teachers. The basic aim is to increase teachers’ salaries to the average salary level across each region, which is definitely an important step and the right thing to do. The teaching profession occupies an important place in everyone’s life and plays an enormous role in our society. Our children’s level of education, upbringing, culture, and ultimately their outlook, aspirations and desires as a whole, as well as the future of our country, all depend on teachers.

So increasing teachers’ salaries is actually about creating more respect for that profession. And also attracting young qualified specialists, because these days very few graduates want to devote themselves to the teaching profession, mainly due to the poor pay. The problem is that any new initiative, innovation or reform is always complicated and involves all sorts of difficulties. All the media are currently full of headlines such as “Schoolteachers’ Salaries to Rise 30% on Average from 1st September 2011”. Ultimately these changes should cover every school in Russia, of course, but it’s hard to achieve this in Phase 1. And I should point out that the funds are being made available from the federal budget to raise teaching salaries only in schools that are taking part in the education modernization project and have introduced the new salary scheme. Also, the pay rise doesn’t apply to further education teachers or administrative staff who also play an active role in running the schools. And there are a number of other issues and restrictions around the teachers’ pay rise.

You know, in my work as a people’s deputy I often come across cases where people are poorly informed. For example, out of ignorance, people demand benefits they’re not entitled to, or, on the contrary, are not aware of the subsidies they are entitled to. Of course, this is partly because the authorities fail to inform people adequately of their rights and obligations. But people themselves should take an interest, get information from social workers and sometimes demand explanations of their rights or try to find answers on the Internet. So part of our meeting was about communicating accurate information on the school modernization programme to the regions and the schools. The party, especially its regional branches, have the vital task of explaining in detail and in layman’s terms to the regional authorities, the municipal governments, head teachers and teachers the rules on allocating and distributing funds under the new system.

I liked the speeches by the representatives from the regions; they spoke about the issues on the ground, including some deficiencies in the programme. Galina Grigoryevna Fomina, a member of the Tula Region Duma, pointed out that the list of schoolteachers who will be getting pay rises does not include teachers of Everyday Safety, which means that schools risk losing the male teachers who mainly take that subject. She was also in favour of providing incentives to school staff who are not directly involved in the teaching process, but who bear the lion’s share of the responsibility for organizing the academic process.

Overall, it was a very informative meeting. As a result, we voted in favour of the council supporting the modernization programme and asked the party’s federal and regional branches to keep a particularly close eye on the efficient and timely allocation of federal budget funds.