III. Distance Education in the USA and Russia

III.A The State of Alaska

What are the main charectiristics of the Alaskan education and distance learning? To answer this question, we will explain higher education and distance learning in the state.

Based on the Section 7.2 and 7.3 of the Alaska Constitution, the University of Alaska is established as the state university. It shall be governed by a board of regents. The regents shall be appointed by the governor, subject to confirmation by a majority of the members of the legislature in joint session. The board shall, in accordance with law, formulate policy and appoint the president of the university. The system president serves as the board’s chief executive officer. (Dobavit upominanie o 11 chlenah soveta is jurid. Dokumenta)

Chancellors for each of the hubs - the University of Alaska Anchorage (UAA), the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF), and the University of Alaska Southea (UAS) - report to the president. The university employs roughly 7,000 people and contributes an estimated $1 billion annually to the Alaska economy.

In the University of Alaska system’s, nearly 35,000 full- and part-time students are enrolled, studying among 500 unique degree, certificate or endorsement programs. Study areas include short-course workforce training, associate degrees, bachelor’s and master’s degrees, as well as doctorates. Programs include a wide array of the sciences, engineering, teacher and early childhood education, business, journalism and communications, aviation, health occupations, history, English, the arts and humanities and many others (The official website of the University of Alaska System).

There is also one private university, the Alaska Pacific University (APU). It offers education grounded in structured, real-world experience led by accomplished faculty committed to an intentionally small liberal arts college. Learning at APU emphasizes rigorous classroom academics combined with challenging field work in the arts and sciences. Like you, we believe that a college education works best when it prepares graduates to contribute meaningfully – in your personal and professional lives – to a world where change is assured. Observing its 50th anniversary in 2009, APU is a private four-year university located near the top of the world, a place where complex natural, cultural and geopolitical systems have international implications. Research and teaching at Alaska Pacific University engages you in the unique challenges and opportunities arising from our regional systems. APU is committed to attracting students and faculty who value learning by doing and the durable knowledge and skills that it imparts. Alaska Pacific University offers experience in education that works. (The official site of Alaska Pacific University).

Since the early 1970s, on average, most Alaska residents have more post-secondary education than people nationally, although the reverse is true for Alaska natives ()Western Interstate Commision on Higher Education, 1996). Although the median age of Alaskan is younger than that for the United States, the median age of students at Alaskan universities is older and a higher proportion of Alaskan high school graduates pursue first degrees out-of-state than is the norm for other western states. Students at Alaskan universities are generally older and there is a higher proportion of women than is the national norm.

Much of the initial demand for Alaskan in-state university programmes came from military and government personnel and teachers, who needed university courses for career development, and who also wanted university education available for their spouses and children. Many spouses of government and military personnel wanted to seize the opportunity of their posting to Alaska to earn a baccalaureate or a Master's degree, especially since there was no suitable employment for them. In response to this demand, and given the well-known and longstanding regional rivalries that permeate Alaskan politics, the Board of Regents created three separate institutions with two different missions, that of naintaining the circumpolar research focus at UAF while meeting local demand for access at UAA and UAJ. Alaska Pacific University has also evolved by offering programmes in response to demand (Hitchins 2002, 139).

Taking into consideration remoteness, it is important to say that infrastructure plays a crucial role for the Alaskan secondary education. In the state there are communities which are accessible only by air, and of those connected by road, some are only connected by winter road for four months of the year. Populations in the different communities vary, sometimes on the order of tens or hundreds. So, it is difficult for small communities to have the same quality of education as large communities (Arctic Human Development Report 2004, 170-171)

Alaska faces a secondary teacher shortage. The shortage is geographically specific. That is, shortages occur only in some schools and some communities. In Alaska, the majority of the schools facing shortages are in rural communities off the road system. These schools, year in and year out, have difficulty attracting and retaining teachers. In fact, the 18 school districts with the highest turnover rates in the state-that is, rates averaging 20 percent annually over the period 1996-2000-are all, with one exception, remote rural districts (McDiarmid 2002).

In Alaska, the population of these communities tends to be predominantly Alaska Native. In addition, the teachers in these hard-to- staff schools tend to be younger and have less experience than their counterparts in low-turnover schools. Most pertinently, these schools are staffed almost entirely by teachers born, reared, and trained outside of Alaska. Among rural districts with an annual turnover between 15 percent and 30 percent, only 14 percent of the teachers are Alaska Natives. In those districts where the annual turnover rate has historically exceeded 30 percent, only 12 percent of the certified staff is Alaska Native (McDiarmid, 2002).

The primary goal of Rural Education Preparation Partnerships (REPP) is to increase the number of teachers in rural school districts who are either Alaska Native or who have lived in rural Alaska for an extended period. Within this goal, the program has an objective to create a suppmiive group of learners among REPP interns by using the LMS Blackboard tools - a teleconference and threaded discussion group.

REPP interns and their faculty are scattered across Alaska, and may see each other only a few times during their program. This can lead to interns feeling isolated and unsupported as they try to balance the academic demands of the program with those of being in the classroom each day. REPP attempts to address this problem by holding meetings for interns periodically and by using technology to support continuing communication, even when participants are geographically separated. For many, their internship year begins with the fall meeting with other interns as well as mentors and REPP personnel. This gives interns an opportunity to initiate personal relationships that can be continued at a distance. During the year, they communicate periodically via teleconference and in threaded discussion groups in their distance-education class. This class is delivered via Blackboard.

In 2000/01, the threaded discussions were sparse; few interns participated and those who did posted only a few times. In 2001/02, interns were required to participate, at least occasionally. This requirement provided the critical mass of communication necessary to make the discussions useful to the interns. Many posted far more than was required. For some interns, the discussion board became a primary tool in soliciting and providing feedback on a wide variety of topics. In 2002/03, this trend continued, and the use of Blackboard again rose.

In 2001/02, about 60 percent of interns appear to have posted the minimum required (or, in a few cases, did not post at all). The remaining 40 percent went well beyond the minimum. By contrast, in 2002/03, only about one-third of interns were posting the minimum or less; the majority were posting more than required. In addition, the program held weekly teleconference calls that took the place of Blackboard's "live chat" feature which had not proved successful in previous years. Faculty posted topics or assignments (as appropriate) for these calls in advance on Blackboard, and reported that participation was high.

REPP program structure has changed for 2003/04, and this appears to be affecting interns' use of threaded discussion groups. Although some interns or faculty accessed the communications area on 219 of 241 possible days in 2002/03, use in the fall, 2003, has greatly declined. Only 35 messages on 3 topics were posted in threaded discussion groups as of December 1, 2003, about 10 messages per month. In 2002/03, program participants and faculty posted 350 messages on eleven different topics, or about 35 per month. In the new program structure, intems will take their portfolio preparation class in the spring semester (rather than throughout the year), and that is the class that has generated the most discussion on Blackboard (Preparation Partnerships: Partnering to Success 2003, 1, 1, 17)

The mission of the Alaska Staff Development Network (ASDN) is to improve student achievement by providing researched-based distance learning and face-to-face professional development programs for Alaska’s teachers and school administrators. In 2012 over 5,000 educators enrolled in an ASDN-sponsored event. We sponsored 30 face-to-face institutes, and 56 distance education classes – including 41 webinars. ASDN is a statewide partnership initiated in 1983 that includes Alaska’s 53 school districts, four colleges and universities, the Department of Education and Early Development, the Alaska Association for Secondary School Principals, the Alaska Association of Elementary School Principals, NEA-Alaska, and a number of professional education associations (The official website of the Alaska Staff Development Network (ASDN).

The priorities of the network is a webinar series on integrating technology into the classroom is planned for the spring of 2014: Distance Delivered Courses on Technology, Using Web 2.0 in Teaching and Instruction, Cyberbullying Prevention, Making Best Use of the Internet for K-12 Instruction, Social Media for Educators, The 21st Century Classroom, Web Page Development, Webinar Series Recordings on Technology, Literacy and the Digital Native, featuring National Experts and Alaskan Educators, Using Technology to Differentiate Instruction, Upgrading to the Digital Classroom: New Media Pathways to Literacy, Learning and Creativity, Creating A Digital-Rich Classroom (The official website of the Alaska Staff Development Network (ASDN)..

The Alaskan universities offers online courses as well. For example, the University of Alaska Fairbanks eLearning & Distance Education has the longest standing distance delivery program offering correspondence courses for more than twenty-five years. It offers hundreds of courses every year, including required courses for various degree programs.

The University of Alaska Fairbanks also offers online instruction and degree programs. The University's online degree programs provide working professionals and full-time students with flexibility, course engagement, and interaction with internationally renowned faculty. Students enrolled in online degree programs can attend courses at anytime from anywhere. Graduate degrees are available for students in the Master of Education track in Online Innovation and Design, M.Ed., bachelor degrees are for the Bachelor of Emergency Management B.E.M. and Justice B.A. Associate degrees are applicable for Applied Accounting A.A.S., Applied Business A.A.S. (Healthcare Management, Human Resources, Management, Marketing, and Public Managemen t), and Associate of Arts A.A. Certificates programs prepare students for Accounting Technician, Applied Business Management, Healthcare Reimbursement, Medical and Dental Reception. The occupational endorsement provides students with the education and training to qualify for Medical Billing, Medical Coding, Medical Office Reception (The official website of the University of Alaska Fairbanks eLearning & Distance Education).

Distance education can solve some Alaskan educational problems. The Alaska educational system also has a Rural Educator Preparation Partnership (REPP), a statewide collaborative effort involving school districts, Native communities, businesses, education professionals and the University of Alaska. The goal of this partnership is to improve the recruitment and training opportunities for Alaska Natives interested in becoming teachers or school administrators.

Native education is a very important element in Alaska. In 1970th years, Native legislators used their power in the university budget process to create community colleges that were not part of the statewide University System budget requests, (posmotret budgetnii process) in Bethel in 1972, Nome in 1975 and Kotzebue in 1976. It also led the North Slope Borough to create its own Inuit Ilisagviat-Inupiat University of the Arctic in 1975 (sait), which represented a break with western thinking about university education and resulted in a very different institution from anything that the University of Alaska System provided.

In 1986, the University of Alaska System faced the need for drastic budget cuts in the face of the collapse of oil prices. Faced with the need to cut back its annual budget drastically, a major reorganisation of the university system was undertaken. Now UAF is affiliated with Ilisagvik College, an autonomous institution created in 1986, and funded by the North Slope Borough by providing quality post-secondary academic, vocational and technical education in a learning environment that perpetuates and strengthens Inupiat culture, language, values and traditions (posmotret college) (Hitchins 2002, 134-136).

The failure of the University of Alaska administration to respond to the request from the Alaska Federation of Natives for Community Colleges (bolshe info) that would offer a specialized curriculum to meet Alaska natives new need for financial and managerial skills, grounded in a program that respected and incorporated their cultural traditions.

Teaching of Native Alaskan languages are also developing through distance education tools. For example, an open learning network of Tlingit language is dedicated to the speakers, teachers, and students of the language. The network introduces teaching technics with playing games in Tlingit. Classes of the Intermediate Tlingit can be viewed through YouTube. The website represents video introductions to the sounds in Tlingit and to sounds using words (The website of Tlingit language).

To sum up, the higher education in Alaska is represented by a large state with tree hubs and a private university. Students at Alaskan universities is older, high school graduates pursue first degrees out-of-state than on the US average. Military and government personnel and teachers create demands for Alaskan in-state university programs. Both universities and secondary schools extensively use distance education to deliver courses and support educators, in particularly, in Alaskan remote and small rural communities where, first of all, Native peoples inhabit. The LMS Blackboard with its tools including threaded discussions dominates. The Native people education plays an important role. Open learning networks of Native Alaskan languages create opportunities for everybody interested in them.

III.B The Russian Federation

What are the main characteristics of the Russian education and distance learning in the North and Siberia comparing to the state of Alaska? What are similarities and distinguishing characteristics? Providing responses, the comparative analysis will be conducted in this part.

According to the 43 Article of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, higher education is free of charge. On a competitive basis, everyone has the right for free higher education in the state or municipal educational institution or enterprise. In the US constitution there is no same mention. Only the Alaska state constitution does it.

However, after the collapse of the Soviet Union there was the decline of educational finance. The USSR devoted approximately 7% of GDP to education in the early 1970's, but this decreased, at least in the Russian Federation, to 3.8% in 1991 and to 3.4% in 1992. Prior to the transition, physical infrastructure was beginning to crack, maintenance was spotty, and equipment was generally antiquated. In 1970, the average teacher salary in the USSR was 81% of the average industrial wage; by 1980 it had fallen to 73% by 1989 to 67%; and by 1994 to 55%. An assistant professor in a Russian university was paid 123% of the average industrial wage in 1960; 70% in 1980; 54% in 1991; and 37% in September 1993. The salary of a full professor dropped from 219% of the industrial wage in 1987 to 62% of the average industrial wage in July 1993 (Heyneman 1998, 25-26).

The proportion of GDP allocated to education in Russia to be lower than in OECD countries and falling in real terms. In 2010, it is approximately 4% in the Russian Federation as opposed to 5.6% in the US (The educational system in the Russian Federation 2012, 3; The official website of the World Bank Open Data).

The functions performed by universities in the social and economic development of Russia are rapidly evolving due to major changes that are occurring in the political and economic life of the country. Many of the structures and processes that existed in the Soviet period are being replaced. The traditional role of the Russian university as a stronghold of basic education and of scientific research is also evolving in response to new priorities and demands emanating from various sectors of the society.

Alaska is the only the one Arctic state in the United States. In Russia there are has more than 25 regions in the North and Siberia, as well as a great number of universities. Only the Northern Economic Region (the European North) has twenty universities.

The universities in the North are experiencing many of these new changes and pressures on post-secondary education. They confront a number of common problems and crises found by universities across this vast country. Yet there are also some unique challenges and opportunities that distinguish their condition from other institutions of advanced education in Russia. A harsh climate a dispersed population base and continuing limited public investment in facilities and infrastructure create major barriers to the future growth and development of these northen universities. On the other hand, their proximity to vast natural resourses, their established working relationship with international networks and the willingness of their administrative leaders to make major innovations in their development roles all point to the possibility that these post-secondary institutions will eventually bring significant change to the Russian north (Vasiliev 2002, 148).

The education in Russian rural and remote areas of the North has a lot of problems. It may be that to many inhabitants of the Russian Federation, especially in the rural parts, the idea of having access to the Internet seems rather unreal, or utopian. At present, for many people in Russia Internet access is simply not feasable. The of computers is restricted to urban areas and, moreover, considerably less than in North America, Western Europe and Japan. The telephone system in many rural areas is not reliable or not automated at all. This is an even more crucial point in the remote areas of the Far North. Electric power supply is an additional problem. Power supply in small settlements is provided by diesel generators, it is restricted sometimes to one or only half an hour daily, power failure occurs quite often (about once a week), and sometimes it lasts for several hours. Under these conditions one cannot rely on photocopiers and fax, let alone computers. It is obvious that the local inhabitants must tackle problems which are by far more elementary than the use of computers or the access to Internet (Habeck 1998).

Howeer, due to the remoteness of schools in northern Russia, new information technologies and distance education are becoming increasingly attractive options. Not all northern schools are uniformly well equipped with computers and software. In the Sakha Republic as of 2003, both village schools and town schools had one computer per 23 students, while in Russia as a whole the average was one computer per 500 students. Most comprehensive schools use local networks, and all secondary schools have internet access (Arctic Human Development Report 2004, 172).

Modern developments of new information technologies and distance learning in the Russian education are mostly based on tree main points. The first one is that the use of them creates a good brand of university for students. The second focuses on the interest in educational programs and methodologies applied to students with disabilities. The third one is connected with convenience and costs. Unfortunately, the advantages of the development of new means of communication and Internet for educational programs among northern and Siberian people in Russia are not mostly taken into consideration.

Higher education in the North has been characterized by extremely low student participation rate. For example, in the Northern Economic Region of Russia the number of residents who go on to some form of post-secondary education is about 115 per 10,000 inhabitants. In the neighbouring North-West Region of Russia – which includes the metropolitan centres of St. Petersburg, Novgorod, Pskov and Kaliningrad – the participation rate is close to three times that of the Northern Economic Region. In Russia as a whole, the participation rate has risen from 170 per 10,000 in 1994 to 190 per 10,000 in 1998. This is still considerably lower than comparable rates in the Nordic countries (225/10,000) or in Germany (250/10,000) or in the United States (340/10,000). The continuing inability of the Region to match overall Russian student participation rates – let alone those of the West – is a less than promising result. It points to one of the continuing barriers to regional development: the lack of a highly educated workforce.

One of the possible ways of solving the problem of providing a wider scope of educational services for the population in the North is the establishment of new universities and branches. New outreach programs on the part of metropolitan universities in Moscow and St. Petersburg stimulate the expansion of high education in the North. (Vasiliev 2002, 155-157).These university branches in the North and Siberia can increase investments on infrastructure, maintenance and equipment. The uniform university standard on information technologies and IT program services helps branches to use modern technologies in the educational process.

For example, the Moscow State University of Economics, Statistics and Informatics (MESI) is the Russian first electronic distributed university. Along with its Moscow campus, MESI comprises 13 branches and about 200 study centers all over Russia (from Kaliningrad to Vladivostok) and abroad (Armenia, Belarus, Israel, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Ukraine and Uzbekistan). MESI provides a wide range of education and training programs at different levels from secondary and vocational to postgraduate to continuing education in mixed modes of full-time, part-time and distance learning, and by using the latest training methods and innovative e-learning techniques. MESI has 70 years of experience in distance education, over 30 years in computer-based instruction and about 10 years of e-learning practice. Nowadays, MESI is considered Russia's leading university largely using e-learning to provide high quality education (The official webpage of the Project ELBEP).

All regional divisions are connected by a uniform corporate network and realize educational programs on the basis of uniform information educational environment with the use of uniform content, library resources, faculty and uniform management.

MESI is a founder of interuniversity network “International e-University Consortium”. Its participants collaborate for sharing ideas, scientific and research results and best practices in e-learning and knowledge management, and follow international trends in the development of modern learning technology (The official website of MESI).

For more than seven years MESI has been providing education for the disabled using the cutting edge computer technology and the customized educational programs and methodology. In 2009 – 2010 the Department of World Economy and International Relations of MESI conducted research in improving the educational programs and technologies for students with disabilities including the project Improvement of educational programs and the development of technologies for using information resources in the learning process for conducting master classes for students with disabilities.

The Department also studies an electronic portfolio role in educational and research development. Hudorenko’s (2011) article is devoted to the student research work in higher educational institutions. The author has revealed key aspects of research in Russia's universities. The student electronic portfolio is a way to improve student research activity. It allows to unite educational process requirements and scientific activity, to generate astudent aspirations for creative and scientific self-realization.

In the MESI educational process, podcasts and videocasts is an important element. Gerasimenko (2013) Practice of using podcasts and videocasts in integrated business english teaching considers and assesses, from theoretical and practical standpoints, the implementation of podcasts and videocasts in the integrated teaching of two courses: B usiness English a nd Knowledge Management. The use of the above technologies enhances the learning motivation of students, provides them with possibilities to realize their intellectual and creative potential and contributes to their more efficient professional training.

MESI regional campuses use an uniform university standard on information technologies and corresponding program services. Branches have an access to all resources of the head higher education institution in Moscow and "mirror" copies of its technological infrastructure. Each student, regardless of his place of resident, has access to all educational resources of university that allows to guarantee the highest quality of training in all regional structures of MESI.

The educational process in MESI branches is organized with the use of Internet technologies via online. The faculty of head higher education institution carries out video lectures for students of branches, and communication between them is carried out through forums. The current certification is carried out in the form of videoconferences and electronic testing. Meetings of distributed departments for teachers of regional campuses are organized in the on-line mode (The official website of MESI).

Unfortunately, MESI as other Russian universities uses a self-made learning management system. It limits distance education effectiveness and does not allow teachers, college and university instructors and educators to use the latest and greatest technology to promote collaboration, as well as assess and improve performance.

MESI has campuses in Northern and Siberian regions: in Buryat, Kemerovo, Perm, Krasnoyarsk, Khakassia and Altai. For example, the Buryat MESI branch is the only educational institution in the Buryat region using distance education for full and part-time students. The brand of the Buryat MESI branch is a distance education environment. Thanks to new multimedia technologies and Internet, e-learning, electronic training, allows to increase the quality of training, quickly to exchange knowledge and to organize collaboration at distance. E-learning technologies, the electronic library, a self-made learning management system of distance education Virtual campus, professional software products and electronic tutorials are actively used in the educational process of all forms. Based on the distance education, study time is optimized.

Besides Virtual Campus, the branch widely uses the Google services: Blog, Documents, Sites which are very effective for problem and active methods of training: discussions, a project method, brain storm, etc. They give the students an opportunity to have a simultaneous collaboration on documents, presentations, drawings, video, etc.

Training in the Buryat MESI branch takes place in network environments by means of computer and Internet. There are up-to-the-minute electronic textbooks, multimedia courses, an open access to various educational resources, a free Internet connection, an online access to the schedule. Classes are organized in the form of virtual seminars, master classes, business games and simulation exercises and trainings. Teachers give lectures via online. Difficult concepts of the debatable plan are discussed through discussion and chat forums. Lecture auditoriums are equipped with computers and Internet accesses, multimedia projectors and interactive boards (The official website of MESI Buryat branch).

Many Russian northern universities using the e-learning environment are facing a motivation problem. For instance, North-Eastern Federal University, previously known as Yakutsk State University, has created a lot of digital training materials, but these materials are not widely and effectively used by educators in the learning process. There are many reasons for this: no access to the Internet … lack of compensation for creating media (Zamorshchikova 2011).

MESI has successfully resolved this traditional problem. A multilevel wage system encourages professors who teach hybrid courses using the e-learning environment by creating course website, engaging students in social learning, weaving multimedia into class content, assessing performance and managing grades, and shareing open education resources. These educators have additional hour payments.

Another illustration of Moscow-based university campus in the North and Siberia is National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE). This higher institution has campus in Perm, the administrative center of Perm Krai. The HSE is a partner of Coursera. Students from all over the world have free access to educational courses delivered by professors of the Higher School of Economics. The HSE offers several courses in economics in English and in Russian on Coursera’s website.

The main HSE’s reason for joining is that Russian students are among Coursera's top twenty most active users, and the Russian-speaking audience is increasingly interested in free distance learning. The university offers a number of basic economics courses as well as courses in applied mathematics, psychology, and courses at the intersection of these disciplines. In addition, HSE has developed two specialist courses beyond the core program — one in using the LaTeХ publishing system, for getting scientific paper (article) published in international peer-reviewed journals, and the other one in intercultural communication with Russians for international audiences interested in Russia.

Coursera co-founder, Stanford Professor Daphne Koller, highlights the importance of this collaboration: “We are very excited to welcome HSE to the platform. Participation on Coursera by Russian students has increased 230% over the last 6 months, making it clear that there is growing demand for open access to higher education. Partnering with HSE, one of the nation's leading research universities, helps ensure that our Russian Courserians not only have access to the top universities in the world, but also to the top universities within their own country” (The webpage of National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE) devoted to Coursera).

As for HSE’s Perm campus, it was established by the government of the Russian Federation, in accordance with the Russian Government's Ordinance No. 1162, dated September 12, 1997, to train skilled personnel to execute economic reforms; to liquidate a branch system of economic and administrative education; to ensure the quality of the higher and additional professional education defined in the government program Structural restructuring and economic growth in 1997-2000, approved by the Russian Government's Ordinance No. 360, dated March 31, 1997; and to use a federal property more effectively. A total of 1245 students are currently enrolled at the HSE-Perm. This number includes 1074 undergraduate students and 171 graduate students (The official website of HSE, Branch in Perm).

Moscow State University of Railway Engineering (MIIT) also aims to create a virtual union of educational resources of transport higher education universities on the basis of distance educational technologies. MIIT is one of the largest complexes of education and research in Russia. It is the all-Russian leader in the sphere of training and retraining of specialists and scientific personnel for transport and transport construction. The University has 29 branches in the different subjects of Russian Federation including northern regions – Ukhta (Komi Republic) and Labytnangi (Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug) (The official website of Moscow State University of Railway Engineering).

Traditionally transport plays a strategically role in Russia. There are a lot of groups involved in the industry policy-making in the social, economic, political and educational areas. Russia’s history at the beginning of the twenty century testifies that the absence of effective business participation mechanisms in state policy formation had negative consequences. It was impossible to carry out a weighed and complex policy in such questions as technical and engineering education, competition between domestic and foreign manufacturers, government orders, housing for workers and the professional press.

At the modern times, there are considerable disagreements between the government and the business which do not allow the railway industry to productively develop. For example, according to the Concept of the development of Incorporated Car-building Company Trasmashholding, federal and regional public authorities are the addressee of businessmen proposals which are aimed at working out an effective and weighed educational, social and economic policy.

Based on the railways businessmen proposal on science and education, they offer to increase federal funding for profile and fundamental science and qualified personnel training. The businessmen recommend the Ministry of Education and Science to be more active in working out and adapting the corresponding legislation (The Concept of development of Incorporated Car-building Company Trasmashholding. 2005). Analyszing the proposal, it becomes clear that the inefficient state policy in the development of profile and fundamental science and education including a lack of new online technologies at railways universities are serious challenges for the Russian Railways.

Higher education in the northern and Siberian regions of Russia needs indigenous language training. One of the positive aspects after the collapse of the USSR is the fact that the number of languages taught in Russian schools doubled between 1991 and 1995. In 1987 students could be educated through grade 10 in four languages other than Russian (Georgian, Bashkir, Armenian, and Tatar). Five years later Russian students could be educated through compulsory education in nine languages (add Buriat, Urdmurt, Chuvash and Iakut). In the middle of 1990s additional 87 languages constituted the part of the curriculum. In some instances, non-Russian languages are used in schools where Russian speakers are in the minority. This adds a different dimension to the question of protecting 'minority' rights. (Heyneman 1998, 28-29).

Indigenous peoples begin promoting their own websites in the Internet, which is very important with a view to the possibilities of distance education as well as with regard to information dissemination. Today in Russia there exist a number of the NGOs that promote professional orientation through the Internet and this tendency in education is growing rapidly (International survey on adult education for indigenous peoples 2000, 20).

Habeck J.O. (1998, 279-281) in his paper devoted to the development of new means of communication and Internet educational programmes among northern aboriginal peoples in Russia highlights the potential role of the Internet for educational purposes. For this very reason, the Minister of Education in the Komi Republic (itochnit v Internete) says that he would like to see the schools of this region to be linked to the Internet quit soon. However, there is a lot of difficulties in accessing Internet.

Nonetheless, some indigenous people languages have websites and open educational resources. There are, for instance, a lot of websites in the Sakha language. The Sakha National Broadcasting TV Programs has a website in Sakha. Another website has Russian-Sakha and Sakha-Russian online dictionaries, Pekarsky’s Sakha Language Dictionary (graphic), a text-book for the Russian-speakers, the Sakha language grammer book, samples of the Sakha folklore texts and songs.

In the conclusion, compare to the USA, the Russian education is regulated by the federal constitution. Russia has more than 25 regions in the North and Sibereia, as well as a great number of universities. The country is facing the educational finance decline, and other new challenges and pressures after the collapse of the USSR. The student participation rate in the North higher education is below the average. The usage of modern developments of new information technologies and distance learning are growing. Self-made learning management systems and the Google services dominate in Russian universities. A lot of attention draws to the distance education infrastructure: computer equipment, Internet accesses, multimedia projectors and interactive boards. Open educational resources are very popular, in particular, Coursera’s website. Indigenous language education is increasing its importance. Some languages have open learning networks and websites.

III.C US-Russian cooperation in distance education

The Russian federation and the United States are different countries. In the Arctic they border each other. What are current and potential US-Russian joint educational and academic projects in the Circumpolar North?

One of the main goals in the US-Russian relations in education is to analyze and expand current US/Russian higher education institution partnerships to facilitate sharing best practices and address common challenges to both education systems by performing research and writing articles, implementing projects, contributing to social media, assisting with organizational responsibilities, and facilitating strengthened interaction among experts and relevant groups in both countries (The official websites of the US -Russia Social Expertise Exchange).

A contribution to this area can concern joint research programs of curriculum development and concrete strategies on how to develop curriculum for a course, including an overview of academic and research resources. For example, the goal of the Russia Fulbright Faculty Development Program is to introduce participants to the best practices and theoretical approaches to curriculum development in the US and provide them with concrete strategies on how to develop curriculum for a course, including an overview of academic and research resources (The official website of the Fulbright program in the Russian Federation).

The author's had an experience in the Fulbright Russia Faculty Development for 2013-2014 academic year (Home Institution: Moscow State University of Economics, Statistics and Informatics (MESI), Host Institution: University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF). He has researched and developed course description, syllabus and outline specific teaching strategies for an interdisciplinary course Interest Groups and Lobbying in the United States.

Building US-Russian university partnerships might be based on such projects as joint research programs of MESI and UAF with the use of information and communication technology. Teaching hybrid and online courses, educators from two countries can create joint course websites, engage American and Russian students in social learning, weave bilingual multimedia into class content and share assessment performance.

Another possible option in building US-Russian university partnerships by distant education is a project on Expository Writing between University of Alaska Fairbanks and Moscow State University of Economics, Statistics and Informatics. The interactive course can involve students in MESI and the students of its branches in the North and Siberia – Buryat, Kemerovo, Perm, Krasnoyarsk, Khakassia and Altai branches. The students are expected to follow the course International Relations and Arctic Governance together from module to module as each module is available online for every participant according to the following course schedule: (1) a professor from UAF creates the modules and posts them online to the students in Russia; (2) within each module, the professor gives directions to the MESI instructors for the face-to-face classroom interactions with the students (in tandem with the online module); (3) The MESI instructors are to enhance the online lessons by engaging the students in face-to-face learning and discussion within each module. In addition, the students have different assignments to post material to each other to read online, particularly during the introductory assignments, which allow them to have some online interaction with each other. They can also post messages online for others to view and send private messages by email. As the instructors in Russia are to enhance the online lessons by engaging the students in face-to-face learning and discussion within each module, the course is considered a distant education course with face-to-face enhancements.

MESI also can create an international wiki project with students from UAF including Academic Writing in Arctic Governance and American English through Digital Storyline. The objectives of the project are as follows: 1) to learn to create the content of an Internet-based course using Web 2.0 technology (blogs, wikis, etc.) and a learning management system; 2) to introduce students to exploring and mastering digital tools, or “to develop their digital competence so that they themselves could discover the pedagogical potential in these tools;” 3) to find ways to incorporate contemporary Internet use and culture into arctic givernance and foreign language teaching; 4) to study each others’ experience of education through e-learning and Internet-based courses; (5) to establish contact between Russian and American colleagues for further cooperation, consultation, and exchange; and 6) to develop Internet-based cross-cultural communication networks between students of Arctic universities for a future teaching community.

Storyline is a method for cross-curricular teaching and learning centred on a specific theme. The main objective is to collaborate on a common storyline based on this methodology, entirely realised through so-called Web 2.0 tools (wikis and blogs) and applications (YouTube, Google tools, etc.) (Brox 2009).

Similar projects had already been conducted was already presented by Pembroke College, Oxford University and Yakutsk State University (North-Eastern Federal University) in 2002. The interactive course is involved students in the head university and its branch in Mirny. The second one was introduced by Yakutsk University and the University of Tromsø, Norway in February 2010 (Zamorshchikova, 2011).

The continuous evolution of the Internet has opened new opportunities and challenges in web based education and learning. The traditional version of web i.e. Web 1.0 started as a Read only medium; the next version Web 2.0 established itself as Read/Write medium. Now the currently evolving version of web, viz., Web 3.0 is said to be a technologically advanced medium which allows the users to Read/Write/Execute and also allows the machines to carry out some of the thinking so far expected only from the human beings. In a short time, Web 2.0 and now Web 3.0 have created new tools and technologies for facilitating web based education & learning (Rajiv 2011).

New information technologies for distance learning are very dynamically and rapidly developing. Russian universities often face a shortage of financial resources, and create learning management systems of their own. Collaborative joint projects can be conducted with the use of a cutting edge learning management system CoureSites by Blackboard.

Joint educational projects in the Arctic Governance or International Relations can be created by an online teaching tool Wikis, a collaborative space within the course where all students can view, contribute, and edit content. Wikis can also be used as a resource for students to view information and content relevant to their courses. Course Wikis are created by a instructor and any course member can add pages, unless the instructor intends to be the sole author and use the Wiki as course content. Group Wikis are enabled by an instructor and can be read by all course members, but a user must be a member of the group to edit a page or make a comment on a Group Wiki page. The Instructor can change the default setting to allow only group members to view a Group Wiki. Comments can be added to any page (The website of CourseSites by Blackboard).

As the effectiveness of e-textbooks was introduced above, using an interactive eBook for such MESI courses as Regional (American) Studies and Introduction to American Government is another effective online learning technology tool. The easy-to-follow eBook gives students access to the same content and page layout of the traditional printed book, but in a flexible electronic format. It offers links to multimedia content including audio, video, articles, reference materials, and data that allow students to delve deeper and explore an important concept or idea where it matters most – on the page where a topic is discussed.

Featuring helpful study tools such as highlighting, bookmarking, rollover in-text glossary terms, and in-text searching, the interactive eBook can be easily downloaded to a computer so student can access the content online from any device, anywhere (Barbour 2014).

Taking into consideration the strategic role of the Russian transportation education, it is very important to develop joint projects in transport universities. Cloud computing might be used by Moscow State University of Railway Engineering to create a virtual union of educational resources of transport higher education universities on the basis of distance educational technologies. Marist College, widely recognized for its leadership in the use of technology to enhance the teaching and learning process, can be its potential American partner.

Enhancing connections between student organizations, and promoting university engagement with the local community to implement community-centered projects, and facilitate student activities is another goal in enhancing partnerships between universities in the US and Russia

As for student associations and social responsibility, for example, the UAF, an American medium-sized university, has over 140 active student organizations. They provide a valuable service to the UAF campus, the Fairbanks community, and students by facilitating and promoting: career development, public service, social and cultural interaction, activism and leadership development. So, this practice can be very valuable for Russian universities where now there is a lack of student association activity and social responsibility projects.

Active UAF Student Organizations include different areas: Academic and Departmental, Greek, Honor Society, Media, Music, and Performing Arts, Multicultural and Language, Political and Activism, Recreation and Sport, Religious and Spiritual, Service and Volunteerism and Special Interest (The official webpage of UAF Student Organizations Community).

Network environments by means of the computer and the Internet is a perfect tool for student organizations from Russia and the USA to communicate, to form a more active and vibrant community, to serve as a unifying force that honors each individual and values diversity.

In the nearest future, Russian and American educators can enhance partnerships between universities in the US and Russia through the development of joint research projects of faculty, curriculum and academic development in distance education, dual-degree programs, and online network cooperation among student clubs. Personally, author would like to promote professional learning management system, e-textbooks, joint research programs with the use of information and communication technology, the Expository Writing, the international wiki project and Arctic student organization collaboration.

Дата добавления: 2015-11-14