The article studies the use of massive open online courses (MOOCs) when implementing educational programs at the university together with the related problems of evaluating students’ learning outcomes. The widespread introduction of online courses into educational practice significantly increases the risks of uncontrolled inflation of grades, which in the future may lead to a loss of employers’ confidence in university education. Within the study, there were analyzed the data of eighteen Ural Federal University’s online courses on the National Open Education Platform (more than 50 launches during the COVID‑19 pandemic). The aim was to assess the quality indicators of the course materials, academic performance, steadiness and regularity of students’ learning with the help of the «Digital Tutor» system. The results of the study show that the existing online courses cannot be a basis for an objective assessment of the real level of students’ knowledge and skills due to the imperfection of test materials and the insufficient volume of the task bank. The situation comes to be even worse thanks to the cases of students’ academic fraud, its traces identified during the analysis of their digital footprint on the platform. This leads to the uncontrolled inflation of grades, that is, to the high average score (82 points out of 100 in the semester and 70 points at the exam), to the shift in the median values of the distribution towards higher scores as compared to the average one, as well as to a critically high proportion of good and excellent marks in all courses (80%). The identified problems do not allow to use MOOCs in an exclusively e-learning model and require mixed learning formats and final certification in the form of an independent test control based on a specially developed bank of tasks that should meet the requirements of psychometrics.

The development in the sphere of artificial intelligence and the introduction of its technologies in the sectors of the Russian economy is a priority task. Within knowledge-based economy, the resource to provide this development is highly qualified personnel. Our article examines the sources of supplying the staff demand in the sphere of artificial intelligence. The main sources are as follows: higher-educated graduates of the corresponding educational programs, self-educated and/ or professionally re-trained workers with higher education. The methodological basis of the study is the balance method, applied to poll and statistical data. It is found out that the demand for personnel with higher education in the sphere of artificial intelligence is going to be supplied by university graduates only at the level of 35 % in the nearest future, which is below the average for the Russian economy. The total contribution of all the sources considered will provide only 70 % of the demanded higher-educated staff. A qualitative analysis of meeting the demand made it possible to identify deficient groups of educational specialties, as well as to form a list of leading universities in training personnel with necessary competencies. This study is the first attempt to quantitatively and qualitatively analyze the sources of covering the staff demands in the Russian sphere of artificial intelligence. The work practically specifies the volume of necessary training, determines the provision with staff according to different groups of specialties / areas of training, and identifies training centers for such personnel. When making system management decisions on adjusting admission quotas, when developing educational programs and professional standards in the sphere of artificial intelligence, this article might be of use for directors and employees of relevant departments, as well as for representatives of the corresponding scientific and educational communities.

This research article is devoted to assessing the compliance of quantitative and structural indicators of the personnel higher education with the needs of the country’s economy. The authors try to determine the main directions for providing the economy with professional staff and the resulting tasks that universities face. The purpose of this article is to compare various indicators of the structure with higher-educated graduates’ number in Russia and in OECD countries (by areas of training), to find out the trends in this sphere, and to identify the reasons for the structural and quantitative discrepancy between the training of professional personnel in Russia and the need for them. There is studied the correspondence of the personnel training structure indicators in Russia by integrated groups of specialties to the predicted indicators of the sectoral structure of gross regional products and employment by types of economic activity. The article also analyzes the indicators of higher educated personnel training per ten thousand people and per GDP for Russia, Germany and the United States. Some results of additional analysis might be interpreted in different ways; the authors’ hypotheses make it possible to eliminate the possible contradictions obtained. An important result substantiated in the article is the medium-term shortage of personnel with higher education, as the number of professional personnel employed in the economy grows to compensate for the low level of labor productivity, the latter happening due to the scientifically and technologically lagging economy. Based on the results of the analysis, there are proposed higher-educated specialists’ shortage compensation mechanisms. This is wherefrom the urgent tasks of university management arise, their solution being of the utmost importance in the current work of university leaders at all levels. The article might be of interest for university leaders and employees, as well as for researchers specializing in the economics of higher education.

The problem under consideration is connected with the active modernization of the research and development sector in Russia, which takes place under existing restrictions. On the one hand, there is a request for scientific and technological sovereignty, increasing the scholars’ responsibility for the social and economic development of the country. On the other hand, the impact of various tools to support the scientists’ activity, these tools affecting their position, reputation and career, is being re-assessed. The article presents data from a 2022 mass sociological survey of grantees (N=1700) from more than 60 Russian regions and more than 80 organizations subordinate to the Ministry of Education and Science of Russia. The survey materials showed the significant role of funds’ grant support for the preservation and development of the scholars’ scientific potential, for attracting new researchers, and for creating a competitive knowledge generation sector. The article analyzes the institutional changes in the activities of Russian scientific foundations as perceived by grantees – scientific and pedagogical workers, administrative and managerial staff. There are identified the most acute problems that make it difficult for Russian researchers to receive grants and to fulfill corresponding requirements in today’s conditions.
For the first time a mass survey of grantees of Russian scientific foundations was conducted, which allowed identifying the most significant functions of grants: economic function; selective function affecting competition among researchers; symbolic function affecting the reputation of scientists, scientific schools, research teams; positive impact on the development of research competencies, careers of scientists, the scientific potential of the higher school, etc. The empirical base of the article is represented by materials collected within a questionnaire survey. The methods of quantitative analysis and content analysis of the open questions were used to process the research materials. Quantitative data processing was carried out using the SPSS program; materials of open questions were analyzed using methods of generalization and systematization.
As a result, there were distinguished the positive effects of grant support over scientists’ research activities, as well as the grantees’ problems to be concerned. The risks of research projects non-completion in connection with the sanctions restrictions imposed in 2022 are analyzed.
The results of the study can be taken into account when developing approaches to the formation of a policy for financing scientific activities in Russia, when working out possible directions for further scientists’ support, and when searching for new mechanisms to support young researchers.

The market of digital educational resources and, in particular, online courses for the higher education system is actively developing. A significant role in creating a high-quality competitive online course is played by the organizational and legal system of interaction between authors and the university. This research article aims at developing a game-theoretical model of interaction between the participants of online course creating process in order to identify optimal (mutually beneficial) options and conditions for partnership interaction between the authors of online courses and the university. To represent the interaction between the authors and the university in terms of game theory, there are analyzed the specific features of creating an online course. The authors are the first to construct a mathematical game model for a typical situation of commercializing an online course within the university-and-author interaction. This situation is interpreted as a dynamic finite paired non-antagonistic non-cooperative game with complete perfect information. The Nash equilibrium, perfect on subgames, is found by the method of backward induction; the profile of optimal strategies is determined. The analysis of the results can help to substantiate, form and improve the strategy of mutually beneficial cooperation between the authors of the online course and the university.

The paper analyzes the pricing strategies of Russian state universities for bachelor and specialist programs. The analysis is carried out by studying the ratio coefficients of the tuition fees and the funding standards for budget students. On the basis of 2016–2019 Monitoring of enrollment quality at Russian universities and Russian Ministry of Science and Higher Education data, it is shown that Russian universities use three types of pricing strategies when attracting a certain contingent of fee-paying students. The first strategy is typical for the leaders of the Russian higher education market: their tuition fee is significantly higher than the funding standards for budget students, while the university’s market niche allows to consistently enroll fee-paying students with a high level of training. The second strategy is used by universities that are able to enroll the required number of fee-paying students with a good level of training on a competitive basis and have advantages at the local and cross-regional levels: tuition fee is approximately at the same level as the funding standards. The third strategy is used by non-selective universities, where the quality of the education allows to enroll fee-paying students only using tuition fees that are below the level of funding standards. The results of the analysis show that competitive universities with a higher level of financial capacity set tuition fees, which significantly exceed the funding standards. At the same time, universities with weak financial capacity and difficulties in fee-paying enrollment are prone to price dumping in violation of regulatory requirements.

The article presents the results of introducing lean manufacturing tools into the practice of a higher educational institution (Tyumen State University) within an academic year. The main research methods are timing, polling and spaghetti charting. There is mapped the organization of the course study. The effectiveness of spending time and resources when running lessons is analyzed.
The issues addressed in the study relate to the productiveness of higher education institutions, their activity to be assessed not only via the characteristics of services, but also via the ways of their provision. Within our research, there was revealed a contradiction between the consumers’ (students’) expectations and the complication of the educational process. This contradiction negatively affects the university’s services quality perception and evaluation in general.
The research shows that managing a higher educational institution in terms of customer orientation involves decomposition and detailed analysis of the main process – that is, of knowledge transfer. All other auxiliary processes are organized around it. Any change in an educational institution must begin with a lean mapping of all stages of knowledge transfer.