Nicholas Zusev came to Russia from Canada in the summer of 2015, just in time for the International scientific conference in Syktyvkar state University, dedicated to the 125th anniversary of Pitirim Sorokin. Zuzev, probably one of the most serious researchers of creativity of the famous sociologist, spoke at the opening plenary talk, spoke about the concept of socio-psychological community in the writings of the scientist. The conference ended, but Tusev did not hurry back to Canada. And left. He is currently Professor in the Department of Culturology and pedagogical anthropology, Syktyvkar state University im. P. Sorokin. Prior to that, he taught at the University of Toronto. Even earlier, in 2005-2006, Intern at Harvard (USA).
The correspondent of “7×7” decided to talk to Nicholas Susewm of education problems we have and there about how to build and develop the society in different countries.
We have to accept that education is the market
— I can be very long to enter, it is something painful — immediately warns Nicholas Suzev. — I looked at all that we have going on [in the Syktyvkar state University im. P. Sorokin], I’m not one year here, he taught at the Institute [pedagogical Institute], the University and Ukhta [USTU]. Know the American and canadian system of education, because there is a lot of years. After you watch and think: what’s going on here? To take a University: everybody knows that teachers are bent under paperwork, professors getting worse. No time to educate myself, studying, to communicate with students. We have professors who lecture on yellow paper almost 1956!
— How is the education system in America? In terms of bureaucratization as difficult?
— There are professors hired on certain criteria. Reputation and field of interest, for example, want to have it read a course on philosophy of science. He develops a course, it is the sphere of his absolute creativity. What’s next? First week at University is shopping. At the first lecture the Professor presented to students, gives everyone a piece of paper with a clear class schedule, course description, list of topics and literature, and asks students who will definitely go. Students huge mass — some leave, others come. They are buyers and in the first week, they change courses, vary.
A student takes, generally speaking, six courses a semester. Three of them mandatory, because relate to his specialization. But there is a choice — for example, social philosophy may be several different courses. If I am a student, I look at the Professor: is it interesting, as he says, if his words of logic. Appreciate. One of the most important things in education — competition among teachers. At the end of the course the student will write what she thinks about the Professor, and will review its ratings.
When my daughter and thought of where to go, decided that I need to get into the University of Toronto. We came to the open day when it is possible to go everywhere, meet with representatives of the different faculties. Distribute a lot of literature. I was amused by the thick Tome, created by the students. There is a description of all professors working in the University, with all their pluses and minuses.
When you look at the North American system, you know, we have to accept that education is a market. The most successful and wealthy universities — commercial. There is a famous, Princeton, Columbia. But there are also universities in the state. Our Syktyvkar state University is also a University of California public. In the United States similar institution are usually financed from the regional budget. This University is very flexible because it serves local and regional needs, adapts to what at the moment, specialists are needed. Among them is also very good, such as Berkeley, but students still pay tuition. It is a service. To be paid for it.
There is a huge difference between our students and American or canadian. There the student in a head will not come to get the lecture the phone and start there’s something to watch during class.
There is a huge difference between our students and American or canadian. There the student in a head will not come to get the lecture the phone and start there’s something to watch during class.
And we have the whole country the mentality of the public sector. So say that we will be no revolution.
— There is no one to do it?
— Yes, for revolution you need a large discontented class. For example, economically independent peasantry (that’s the idea of Ted Skocpol from Harvard, she studied the great revolutions of the past, including the Russian revolution, and came to the conclusion that one of the main conditions of their success was the peasant masses, dissatisfied with their position). Or, as now, the truckers who feed themselves, pay taxes. After trying to introduce a new tax they protested: guys, are you ofonarel?
The public sector is completely different, gives them money by the state. Even if the government cuts back on revenues, it is still the hand of the giver, which is not going to bite. Student we have exactly the same comes at a budget place, and no sense of responsibility he does not.
In the United States gives money and knows why he paid for a specific course. I came to the lecture, I will squeeze out a teacher that can. There will not be, as we do, the students say: Nikolay Fedoseevich, let us go into the dining room early today.
But we also have a paid education, however, often pay not to learn, and to receive the diploma.
— Yes, we even pay the level of this attitude: “I paid you and I still put a deuce?” We are not working. I really like the canadian model, they found a good balance. And in Germany, free education, even for foreigners. But look at University rankings, where are the Germans? They are there almost no.
— You’re talking about rich countries. Russia, in comparison with them, more poor, there are a lot of people who just can’t pay.
In Canada, entering the University you automatically receive a loan from the state.
— And how to give?
— And are you going to do after graduation, and then begin to pay only after a year because you will be given time to find a job and start earning. And you pay only if the income allows you to provide yourself and family. These payments can last for life, but the charged percentage is small. It is important that you guarantee that even if no money, you can get a quality education.
The perversity of our system starts with the schools.
Need to finally start vypisyvat out the losers. This lack of responsibility starts when the student realizes that the deuce he does not deliver, not to spoil the performance, and transferred to the next class.
Need to finally start vypisyvat out the losers. This lack of responsibility starts when the student realizes that the deuce he does not deliver, not to spoil the performance, and transferred to the next class.
— I have a friend nurse who works in two shifts, in order to drag two sons and to pay for rental housing, she does not have time to work with children. What to do?
— Nothing can be done. It is impossible to solve the problems of all families. He wants our bureaucratic system? To solve all the problems. But it’s impossible. Any system of social life, including education, must work to balance social risks and effectiveness. One of the objections that I foresee: where would he go if expelled from school, go to the alley? Though the government complains about the lack of working specialties. If you first provide secondary education, and then all go to University, where you have these professionals come from? Need: flew from ninth grade — that’s a vocational school across the street.
Now began the policy of reducing private universities, which from my point of view, the deepest idiocy. I hope that if universities will be less, some will go to welders. Yes, do not go.
The American school of three levels: elementary, middle, high (low, medium, high). The school has a staff of consultants who are constantly working with the students. Students recommend courses based on where they want to do in University, College or trade school (vocational school). There is differentiation, individual attitude, but baby, no one will.
Recent years a lot of talk about the exam. The motivation is clear — corruption in school. The student finishes school with honors, goes without examination in University, and it turns out that he knows nothing. But now I went to the other extreme: all the teaching turned to coaching on the exam, and the student still knows nothing. Must be approached intelligently. America’s got SAT – a national test required by most colleges and universities, but not only him. Look and your grades during the years of study, additional documents. Then call for an interview. In addition, a good University keep a system of scouts who go to the schools and watching children since high school. This multi-stage system verification. Something should be applied.
From Russia, many in America go. The children say that it is easy to learn. Nothing of the sort! If you don’t want to, you can of course sit at the last Desk, and the teacher will not tell you anything. But then you’d be on a par with everyone writing the test. You “three” no one is going to pull. Put exactly what you deserve, then you’re just out of school.
— God is with her to America. Our main problem is what? The level of professionalism in all areas is very low? Bad specialists?
— I think so. Returning to the issue of private universities. Why decrease — stupid thing? Because destroyed competition between public and private universities. You need to understand that without private capital in education will be nothing. The state now wants to crush under itself, but simply there is no such money. Terrible bureaucracy stifles all. Private universities are blamed for the fact that they give bad education. But guys, you don’t take out bad vodka from the shops, so there’s a need. There is a need and in a poor education. Bad vodka will leave the store when all the vodka is good and cheap. If affordable will be a good education gone bad.
Closing private universities, you deprive them of the chance to do something. Private education, on the contrary, we need to give tax breaks to help you, because if I choose private education, the state saves on me. We now have unemployment in the high school, people could work in private universities, to feed himself, his family, to pay taxes. And now we have to pay these people unemployment benefits. This is absurd.
— What can you say about the associations of universities in many regions of Russia? In Komi brought together Pedagogical Institute and the University of Syktyvkar.
What I will say, of course, many people do not like it, but I believe the unification of the pedagogical Institute, Syktyvkar state University is correct. I’m joined by USTU.
— What I will say, of course, many people do not like it, but I believe the unification of the pedagogical Institute, Syktyvkar state University is correct. I’m joined by USTU. It is important to the pooling of resources: it is easier to get grants, to establish international contacts, to vary the teaching staff, to seek a livelihood. Of Syktyvkar state University is the state University, in fact. There is such a SUNY (state University of new York), it has branches in all cities. He educates a variety of professionals who need the state. This is a very flexible system. Want close to a private University? Please. The question is: a teacher-will be running back and forth. Write in his contract that he only works on one University. Who will pay more, and get a teacher. It is necessary to create competition.
If the country wants to mean something, she needs to learn English like a native
— In a tough competitive environment why do we need the Humanities?
— My students sometimes ask why we need philosophy. I usually laugh off: to understand that you need to be careful with ideas. Here was the great philosopher Marx, and his ideas made our country? In General, the simplest answer is: there is a need. Somehow there are always people who want to understand the philosophy or culture, there are literary faculties — people want to learn how to write, is journalism.
If the answer sociologically, we can recall the famous formula of max Weber. Marxism argues that we are governed by economic interest. But Weber was talking about the fact that we have a “switchman” in the head that switches from one idea to another. Someone could get rich by stealing it, and someone by using a talented financial combinations in the securities market. People succeed in different ways, depending on what ideas in his head. So, we need to deal with ideas.
— If to speak about Russia as about the supplier of some of the ideas, people, ideas which have become very popular, we can recall Bakhtin or the formals. But it was long enough. And that Russia now can give the humanitarian sector?
Nothing.
Why?
Because almost a hundred years, still continuing communism, we killed the Humanities.
But Bakhtin and the formalists was in Soviet times.
— Yes, but the formed-that they as individuals and as scientists. Everyone in the world knows Dostoevsky, Tolstoy. Everyone knows Solzhenitsyn, but had not read it, and then the Russian mafia and prostitutes — that’s all our cultural values.
— You want to say that we are in this market a hundred times to sell the same thing?
— Yes, we have nothing, it must be admitted.
What to say to the Deputy of Spring do not like it, I guess. Watch what makes smart dictator Nazarbayev in Kazakhstan — higher education translates into English. First year students deal with English only. Then come to different professors, lectures — all in English. They have a couple of universities working on these programs, for example, Kazakh-British technical University — 100% of teaching in English, with issuance of diplomas of British universities. Predict what will happen in the next few years. In Russia, the money ran out. Many people send their children to study in Europe and America. Now this is not possible. But there is Kazakhstan, which gives a diploma of the same quality as the average American University. Road is shorter and cheaper, there is no language and cultural barrier, because there all speak Russian, education would cost much cheaper. Kazakhstan is making money at the expense of Russia. A great business project!
If we had a decent government they would take that right now: we have a better tradition stronger, more reputational universities. And we do a complete *****! I have even no words.
The government instructed the universities to get the first hundred universities in the world. They grabbed one of the indicators publication in journals. Invite American or European professors, include the state and use their publications. This is treating the symptoms, not the disease. In reality, the University, even if they get a hundred, will remain the same wooden, and even worse because you spent money on this Professor, that is not paid somewhere yourself and the quality of teaching fell. You have to change the structure, system, then you will have a publication. It’s completely insane and is only for bureaucracy, which lives at the expense of the “tick”.
•••
— To be successful, Russia must integrate into the world. But the country, on the contrary, is closed.
— We are closed and artificial, and naturally. You need to understand that the academic world has changed a lot over the last twenty years. Because of the Internet. In Soviet times, we were behind in the Humanities, but not hopeless. If not ideological rubbish, we could all quickly to compensate. It turns out, for example, the famous book of Robertbasic “Anarchy, state and utopia.” We read, translated, negotiated the rights five years now, and students reading this book. For such a system, there’s no going back, because the modern world does not live as many academic books as articles. Someone in San Francisco was published in the journal, I got it, I read and began to discuss on the Internet. The world of academic translations is over, now science exists in English, which is used in all international conferences — you have broken English or not, you will understand, will listen to you argue. If the country wants to mean something, she needs to learn English like a native.
When I hear this nonsense about “we do not know Russian language”, I want to say: you guys know him from the cradle, and you do not know, you Word correct. Or Komi, now, this statement, too many people do not like it, but Komi and I can say it: we have Russian schools teach Komi language, and I think that it is a waste of time and money. Who knows him, he knows from the cradle, and who knows, the school still did not learn.
— It attempts to preserve the language below has not disappeared, as, for example, a number of Celtic.
He’s still gonna fade away, fade away and the Russian language, and German. Will be the world language of English or some kind of Esperanto. I know this is a reputational thing and need moral support to the people of Komi. Well, open the Komi elite boarding school somewhere in the village in English and accept to all children. Let the child since the fourth grade will be in the Komi language environment in the home, and the school let him study the English language. The man who will come, can continue to study well will become the head of the district, and even the head of the Republic — that is to be a resource for local Komi the bureaucracy.
You know the Komi language?
— Of course, I speak Komi. I grew up in a very specific environment. My mother was the Director of the orphanage, and most of the kids in it were Russian. Mother brother and raised one, almost all the time we spent in the orphanage with these kids. So I have two native languages: Russian and Komi. Moreover, communication in such an environment has become my vaccination from any chauvinism. In adult life my nationalism was a shock: how nationality may be your criteria by which you judge the person?
— Where do you run into this problem?
— In the army. Multinational military environment struck me.
— And in America this how?
— Very difficult. America is different from Russia because there are very smart and very responsible elite. They understand how dangerous any inter-ethnic or inter-ethnic strife. This is especially true for Canada. For example, in Toronto a very large Jewish community and a very large Palestinian group. It’s easy to guess what they think about each other. But publicly nobody and nothing ever bad about each other will not say. If you do something similar will do, you can assume that your career is finished. If you have made a racist remark at work, and you will be immediately fired.
American politics as an alcoholic on the road
— How then do you assess the odious statements of Donald trump, who is involved in the primaries, intending to run for the office of President of the United States?
Is the game market, where people want to sell their ideas in the game allowed a lot a politician can’t afford outside the election campaign. Trump is a very smart man with a good team. They clearly figured out where his niche, and are clearly on it. In this niche a lot of unhappy Mexicans who come and take jobs, immigrants, Muslims. Trump plays on these feelings.
But it was a populism.
— Clean water! Trump will not be President and may not even be nominated. But if by some miracle win the elections, it will behave completely different. Frankly, assuming he even sure to lose. It just makes one more publicity — another name, which then will make the capital.
Important here is the General attitude. That was a normal device, it is necessary that the society belonged to the government as salaried managers.
I go on terrible icy streets of Syktyvkar. And they all go, all this is normal. I swear to you: no administration, no American or canadian city would have not survived if they were here in the winter these streets.
I go on terrible icy streets of Syktyvkar. And they all go, all this is normal. I swear to you: no administration, no American or canadian city would have not survived if they were here in the winter these streets.
Even if the next elections were five years, they would have remembered all the streets and kicked kick.
— It’s independence. In Ukraine, as Yanukovych was removed, and we said, “why, ousted the legitimate President, it is iniquity.”
— And what he did as President, it was not lawlessness? However, I heard they have now changed little, and it is possible that Poroshenko will end up like Yanukovych, and in order to get. If you were elected, do something. I sometimes look at canadian politics and one party after another and think: guys, you can agree together to rule, why this game? I think that somewhere deep in the minds of them sitting thought: either we’re playing here, or the alternative would be independence, of course, is my subjective perception.
Is the principle of balance has swung to the right, then left.
If American policy mistakes? Yes, the sea! Look at George Bush, hate him in America, so, by the way, his brother Jeb was virtually no chance of success. American politics as an alcoholic on the road: he staggered here — you corrected, the next President has staggered back again corrected. Due to this he falls into the ditch and staggered is where they are going. We have a policy different: chose someone, and he went, went, went. But where is it going? Him all started shouting: “Boy, stop that, you’re healthy?”. But he keeps going, knocking down trees on the way. You need to understand that may not be a perfect system, each problem should lead to a search for compromise in this system.
•••
— The liberation of man from responsibility is paternalistic moment.
— The state of man, independently decisive of their destiny, is not necessary. Here at the University [SGU] a year ago there were some terrible test. My friends told me that happened something horrible: everybody has been raised the documents five years ago. Guys, you have a teacher receives a penny. Remove the senseless bureaucracy and start the money saved to pay the fine teachers. If you really really need to check the finances in any one sector. If there’s something there, check on, and if not — it is very likely that the whole University net. Why are you wasting time and money, why to bring shock — the teachers fainted, an ambulance had to be called.
It’s a huge bureaucratic monster that sucks the blood, not allowing people to do no science, no creativity, no teaching. The horror of it.
It’s a huge bureaucratic monster that sucks the blood, not allowing people to do no science, no creativity, no teaching. The horror of it. Check all pointless because you waste so much time and money that it does not pay off to those that can return to the state Treasury.
— When you are now looking at students of SSU what hopes and perspectives do you see?
— I our students really like. They could successfully study at the same American universities under the appropriate conditions and circumstances. They are smart, interested, open. By the way, they are very different from those which were 10 years ago — now they are much more relaxed, freer. But a lot depends on the teacher. If you give them interesting stuff, think in the classroom with them, they begin to reflect together with you, and sometimes even faster, because they feel better. I have a very good impression. I’m just afraid that when they are integrated into our reality, they will have somewhere to limit, to pinch myself to kill my curiosity — that’s scary. And so, it’s beautiful young people, not blinkered, not loaded with stereotypes. For me, they are one of the main incentives to work.
Nikolay Fedoseevich Suzev. Professor, Department of cultural studies and educational anthropology, Syktyvkar state University. P. Sorokin. Scholar Pitirim Sorokin. Graduated from the philological faculty of Syktyvkar state University. Philosophical education in the graduate school of the faculty of philosophy of Moscow state University. University. Doctor of philosophical Sciences. He taught at the Komi state pedagogical Institute (1995–2011), Syktyvkar state University (2010–2011), headed the Department of philosophy Ukhta state University (2006–2009). In 2005-2006 interned at Harvard University (USA) as a Professor. In 2013 he received a law degree at Everest College (Toronto, Canada). From 2012 to 2015, he taught at Massey College (University of Toronto, Canada).
