4 facts about why Russian education is good, but nobody wants to study there?
Russia is not a kind of country which associates with a good education, but, as a matter of fact, the education in a few universities is complete and extremely complex. Most of the time, not all students can successfully finish their programs. The list of such universities is not huge, but it's possible to find at least 2-3 good quality universities in main big cities.
If you compare the level of knowledge among ordinary Russian and European students, then I tend to say that Russian students are better and wider educated. The difference is that students in Russia study not only specialized subjects but a lot of other "unnecessary" ones. For example, every mathematician in a university will be required to study history, sociology, philosophy, and even life safety fundamentals. I agree that they are not able to excel these subjects, but at least they listen to lectures and learn main concepts which gives them a wider area of thoughts.
Unfortunately, Russian education is not perfect and in this article I provide 4 reasons why students try to avoid studying in Russia.
#1 Lack of respect for students
What most Russian universities lack is the respect for students: unfortunately, the vast majority of professors and administration workers don't care about students or whether they fully understand the material or not. This behavior makes it difficult for those who want to achieve knowledge in difficult topics because the time is limited, but there are a lot of assignmets and deadlines. Fortunately, most professors are very interested in talented students who are interested in science, and they try to provide a special attention to these students. From my experience, if you are studying in a university which level is above average if you are interested in science and show it to your professors, then with just a little luck you will be able to go through university years without major problems.
But it is not the worst scenario if a professor explains material in a difficult, unstructured, or even careless way. You can find a lot of situations when professors don't care about their students at all: they can skip their classes when they want, sleep on classes, or exams, be late for 40-50 minutes, and so on.
#2 Unnecessary difficulty
It turns out that Russian schools, especially physics and mathematics school, are way too difficult for students to study in. There are so much information, assignments, and projects, that students physically don't have enough time to learn and understand everything. In this case, people start learning everything by heart without understanding what they learn, which ends up in a total misunderstanding of everything that they are supposed to understand.
#3 Terrible studying environment
If you try to compare the overall environment between US universities and Russian universities, then there will be simply nothing to compare. Most university buildings in Russia are very old, ugly, and pretty much fall apart from the inside. Moreover, the equipment in universities is mostly pretty old, even though they try to renew it, which makes it sometimes difficult to work, slowing down the learning process.
#4 Poor job opportunities
The biggest problem that every Russian student faces is the lack of job opportunities after the graduation. Russian education is valued neither in Russia, not in any other country. In Russia, there is a very big problem with jobs' offers, which doesn't let all graduates work in their fields of study. But I honestly don't understand why Russian diplomas are not valid in other countries in the world. Maybe it is because not that many people speak English fluently. It's true, but I don't see it as a reason for not giving the education a credit.
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