Master in Kyrgyzstan

KD Dobayev, Ph.D., Professor

On the implementation of master's programs in Kyrgyzstan

After the resolution of the Government of the Kyrgyz Republic No. 496 "On establishing a two-level structure of higher professional education of the Kyrgyz Republic" more than a year has passed. Prior to this resolution, Kyrgyzstan has already acquired a certain amount of experience in implementing master's programs by some higher educational institutions in Kyrgyzstan. So, for example, in the pedagogical directions the master's programs functioned at the Kyrgyz State University named after I.Arabayev, on economic directions in the KNU named after J. Balasagyn, etc. In general, in Kyrgyzstan, to date, a certain idea has developed and some experience gained in the master's program and master's program.

According to the Law on Education in Kyrgyzstan, a master's degree is regarded as a second higher education, and therefore, as the survey shows, about 50% of students in master's programs have a course and are trained in programs far from the first higher education. For example, I graduated from a student in the specialty "Teacher", and entered the magistracy in the direction of "Economics" and there are many such examples. This once again confirms that a clearer understanding of the master's and master's programs is needed.

So, if we proceed from international documents, including the basic documents of the Bologna process, we can state that the master's degree is the level of education that follows the bachelor's degree. Accordingly, this is a higher level, where the requirements for the graduate are quite high. A graduate of a master's degree must have such competencies that will allow him to work where more specialized skills and proficiency are required that have deep theoretical knowledge, that is, a specialist with a fundamental vocational education.

In basic higher education general or more universal competencies prevail, and therefore, in the preparation of bachelors, the main attention is paid to the formation of general and universal competencies, which in percentage terms are about 70%, while the preparation of master's programs focuses on the formation of scientific and narrow professional competencies. General educational or universal competencies for teaching in a master's degree are formed through elective courses at the request of the trainees themselves.

So, who is a Master? Magister (from Latin) - mentor, teacher, leader. In the Russian translation - "master of his craft." In ancient Rome, an important official corresponding to more than 50 positions. In the modern Anglo-American system of higher education, the "master" occupies an intermediate position between "bachelor" and "doctor."

What is the state of the master's degree in Kyrgyzstan? As stated above, the master's program in Kyrgyzstan is at the stage of formation. There is still no common understanding of the magistracy in society, and few people have an idea of master's programs. In general, the two-level preparation of the bachelor-master for our system of vocational education is a new phenomenon. At us basically prepared on a specialty, i.e. Typical curricula were focused on the training of a specific specialist: engineer, builder, architect, teacher of Russian language and literature, etc. A person having obtained a diploma in a particular specialty could work on this specialty in one place before retirement. Often in society it was possible to hear: "in the workbook there is only one record", that is, that a person worked in one place and in one specialty.

For an industrial society, such an order is a natural phenomenon, but not for a postindustrial society. In a post-industrial society, knowledge becomes more and more "mortal." As E. Toffler said: "Today's fact becomes tomorrow's delusion. This is not an objection to the study of facts or data - not at all. However, a society in which an individual changes jobs, residence, social ties, etc. Attaches great importance to the effectiveness of education. The school of tomorrow must give not only information, but also ways of working with it. Pupils and students should learn to discard old ideas, to know when and how to replace them. In short, they must learn to learn and re-learn. The illiterate person of tomorrow will not be one who can not read, but one who has not learned to learn. "

And under these conditions, the master's level, which is inherently multivariate and flexible, is individualized, having the property of rapid changes, rather than other levels of education, is becoming more and more in demand. A person who has a basic education then during a lifetime proceeding from individual needs and a public request can pass two or more master's degrees. That is, master's training becomes such a level of education that allows a person to reorient himself during life to another direction or region. And so we think there should be a lot of master's degrees. They should be more specialized and fundamental than other levels of education.

The baccalaureate level, as we know, is more standardized with the same set of competences regardless of the direction of preparation, that is, the bachelor's level is more universal and this level is also called the basic level of higher education.

Master's programs must be very much, therefore, the development and approval of master's programs should be carried out by universities in each direction separately, taking into account the socio-economic situation, as well as the demand in the labor market. In a word, master's programs are the most individualized and practical-oriented. At the same time, universities when developing master's programs must adhere to those parameters that are laid in the Dummy of the state educational standard of higher professional education, the master's degree approved by the Government Decision of August 23,

To date, the following directions of master's training have been outlined in Kyrgyzstan: the research, which is mainly aimed at preparing for research work, after graduating from the magistracy, enter post-graduate studies in order to defend candidate's and doctoral dissertations. The second direction is related to teaching activities, which represents a group of people who are purposefully entering the magistracy to work in the system of vocational education. And, finally, the third direction is more narrow, specialized, in which those who would like to deepen and broaden their knowledge of previously received education continue to study.

All these directions of master's training, of course, were spontaneously based on the social and economic conditions of the republic. But among all directions, most of those who study under the Master's program for further admission to graduate school and associate their future activities with teaching or research activities. We believe that such a phenomenon is natural, when economic conditions, or rather, the economy of Kyrgyzstan is in a deep crisis is possible, therefore, in the third direction, that is, the specialization, the fundamentalization of the previously obtained education is studied by units.

The next very important question when we are talking about the master's and master's programs is the content of education. The analysis conducted by the Center for Problems of Vocational Education of the Kyrgyz Academy of Education shows that at present there are no certain strictly established norms when drafting the content of the Master's program in Kyrgyzstan. Although there is an approved Layout of the master's level, which in its essence, as it were, continues the basic parameters that have been worked out to date. These are two years of study, 120 credits, one credit of 30 hours, three cycles, namely: a general scientific cycle, a professional cycle, practice and research work, and at least 40% of the basic component. As we said above, there are master programs with different targets. How, for example, to be with the program, where the main emphasis is on specialized, in-depth training? What should be the proportion of educational disciplines in this scenario? How much credit should be allocated for research, etc.

If we are talking about the competence approach in the education system, it means that when preparing the masters, it should be determined which competencies should be formulated at the end of master's programs in this or that direction. All these questions require research and careful study.

Summarizing the above, we propose the solution of the following questions:

1. Introduce amendments to the law "On Education", where it is clearly stated the place and status of the magistracy in the education system. Master's degree is not the second higher education, but the second higher level of education. The main goal of the magistracy is to train specialists more focused on scientific research work and striving to continue education in postgraduate study for the defense of candidate and doctoral dissertations. Those. These specialists are easily adapting, both in theoretical and practical activities, rationally and effectively using their scientific potential. In other words, the purpose of the magistracy, as a second level of education, is to create the conditions for the formation of a high-class professional. This, in turn, is determined by the assurance of mastering the theory and practice of scientific activity on the basis of an in-depth study of the area that he himself chose.

Therefore, the final attestation of graduates of the master's degree should consist of two consecutive stages: 1) the master's examination; 2) preparation and defense of the master's thesis.

The master's examination must include at least two exams: the methodology of science and the examination in the profile.

The defense of the master's thesis must be public with the participation of leading experts in this field.

2. The Ministry of Education and Science of the Kyrgyz Republic needs to identify basic educational institutions where it is possible to prepare for master's programs, since not all universities can provide training for specialists at the master's level. To date, there are universities where there are master's programs, but there is not a single doctor of science in the program profile. At us in Kyrgyzstan there was, any, light-weight attitude to a magistracy. If you look at the history of the formation of a master's degree in Russia (we focus on the Russian model), after graduating from a master's degree, they gave academic titles to a privat-docent or an extra-ordinary professor.

Therefore, attestation management at the MoE of the KR should revise the licensing rules permitting the functioning of the magistracy.

3. Additions must be made to the approved Mockup of the State Educational Standard of Higher Professional Education level "Master".

In the standard, prescribe that the proportion of independent work should be at least 80% of the total workload of the program, and that for each trainee, an individual curriculum for the entire period of training should be developed and approved by the Academic Council.

In more detail, describe the final attestation of master's programs. If these additions and refinements will be made master's programs only benefit from this.

4. In the development of individual curricula, institutions themselves determine which competencies should be formed by the end of the training, based on the competencies specified in the State educational standards. And those competencies that are presented in the State educational standards for pedagogical directions, the master's level requires more detailed elaboration. The Center for Problems of Vocational Education of the KAO is working on clarifying and further elaborating certain competences, which will be subsequently submitted for further discussion.

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