In an effective Moscow university, state-sponsored students must have a minimum of 63 USE score and 11 square meters of floor space. Research must earn at least 95000 roubles per staff member, gross income must be a minimum of RUB 1,5mn, at least 3% of graduates must be foreign students. If a university fails to comply with any four key criteria, it is deemed ineffective.

Out of 502 state universities, 134, or 26,7%, and less than a half (453 из 930) of branches turned out to be ineffective. In Moscow, 20 out of 79 are ineffective, including RSHU, Management University, Moscow Architecture Institute. None of them could be reached for comment yesterday.

The fate of the ineffective will be decided by regional workgroups, drafting proposals for each university, according to Deputy Minister of Education and Science Alexander Klimov. Universities may receive additional funding or stronger management. Should the workgroup conclude that a university is incapable of maintaining a high quality standard of education, the establishment could face reorganization, warns the Ministry of Education and Science.

In the next 2-3 years, 20% of universities and 30-35% of their branches could be closed, said Minister Dmitry Livanov in July.

The monitoring paints a fairly adequate picture, says Rector at Higher School of Economics Yaroslav Kuzminov. However, introducing the floor space factor is questionable, he says: Russian State Humanitarian University has failed due to this, despite the high quality of education.

The share of foreign graduates also does not help select quality universities, says Kuzminov: many effective universities have a very low rate, and many ineffective ones border-trade diplomas. It is more reasonable to assess the quality of graduates by independent exam or median income in the first five post-graduation years, says Kuzminov.

Key indicators in global practice are the amount of publications in leading international magazines and citation ratio, notes Pro-Rector at Russian School of Economics Konstantin Sonin.

Margarita Lyutova, Mikhail Malihin, Olga Kuvshinova

Project Group №6