To the degrees of famous

The reason for this note was a survey conducted by the highest certification commission of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation on October 8 regarding the introduction of a single -level system of scientific degrees. I want to make a reservation right away that I see no reason to discuss this initiative in itself until the moment until they are indicated:

(1) qualification requirements for a new scientific degree and their differences from the requirements for current candidate and doctoral degrees;

(2) the goals of changes in the system of scientific certification; (3) At least approximately - organizational mechanisms of transition to a new certification system. Accordingly, until then I consider it meaningless and filling out any profiles on this topic. However, the obvious lightweight and some kind of deliberate negligence of the proposed Higher Higher Attic sponge caused me a desire to figure out how and thanks to whose activity such a product could be born.

At the moment, on the VAK website, in the "News" section, there is a page [1] with an invitation to fill out the questionnaire online [2]. This email address is already surprising. The fact is that the SurveyMonkey system is a system for collecting and processing data, the headquarters of which is located in Palo-Alto (California, USA). There are also all data servers of this system. Why does a government institution collect and store data regarding the organization of scientific activity in Russia in a place that Russian jurisdiction does not apply? This may be the result of the security of the survey organizers or a deliberately frivolous relationship. Further research only confirms this.

Although the survey is now automatically made in online mode, in the first hours after the survey was announced on the VAK website, a certain M.V. Luck, indicated as the director of the Institute for Innovations of Infrastructure and Investments, proposed to fill out the questionnaire "manually" and send it by e -mail. The version of the announcement with this proposal is now not available on the Higher School of Economics, but can be found in the cache of the Google search engine [3]. I do not presume to judge that it was the reason for such a hasty change of system for collecting questionnaires-the desire for anonymity, the desire to reduce costs or something else. In any case, such a haste does not indicate the professionalism of people who are entrusted with a survey, on the basis of which very serious and resonant decisions will be made in turn.

So what is the Institute for Innovations of Infrastructure and Investments (III), to which the Ministry of Education and Science turned to for help? The institute’s website [4] states that this is LLC (limited liability company). There is no data on his authorized documents, employees of the institute and their direct work. The only employee who can be learned about is the director of M.V. Luck itself is the institute’s site is simple to the limit (it is better to say that it is primitive both from the point of view of structure and filling) and does not contain any substantial information. Moreover, the technology used to create a “content” part of the site does not allow access to it from modern mobile devices. All this suggests that the III website is intended for anything, but not to attract and inform potential customers. And this site testifies to "innovations" to an even lesser extent.

Further search issued mainly outraged reviews of those who worked at the Institute at one time or another. The organization has enormous staff turnover. For example, according to Orabote.net, the “unreliability index” (the probability of dismissing an employee newly hired by the “institution” in the foreseeable future) is 86% [5]. It is clear that in such conditions, the organization is simply not able to provide any information about its employees and their achievements.

In a word, I have no doubt that IIII, involved in the process of redrawing the system of certification of the scientific personnel of Russia, is a kind of corporate Chichikov. Accordingly, the question arises, how much the questionnaire and survey on its basis cost the budget of the Russian Federation and how many of this amount went to the survey as such. The costs of the organizational and technological side of this event (taking into account automation through the SurveyMonkey system) amount to 6549 rubles. when using the system during the year [6]; Let me remind you that the duration of the survey is one week. I strongly suspect that the money for the questionnaire entered a contract concluded by Mon. It is no secret that the contracts from Mona begin with sums, two orders of magnitude, at least more. I do not have time to study the competition documentation of the ministry to find out which lot is aimed at supporting this, so to say, work and who exactly is responsible for it in the ministry. I believe that the clarification of these details should be in the competence of people from a completely different department.

At the time of delivery, the survey page is not available; There are no traces in the news feed of the Mon website.

SAMPLE

Director of the Department of Certification of Scientific and Scientific and Pedagogical Workers I.A. Shishkanova

Copy: Minister of Education and Science D.V. Livanov

Dear Inessa Alekseevna!

On the website of the highest certification commission on behalf of your department and a certain Institute for Innovations of Infrastructure and Investments (5ia LLC), an invitation was published to take part in the survey to the transition to a single -stage system of scientists: http://vak.ed.gov.ru/ru/news/index.php?id54=776.

I draw your attention to the fact that the survey is conducted with gross violations of the generally accepted sociological methodology:

• the representativeness of the sample is not ensured;
• More than one response is allowed from one respondent;
• A number of questions are formulated incorrectly and prevents the objective expression of the respondent's opinion;
• The survey is repaired by the SurveyMonkey.com site, whose confidentiality policy makes it impossible to publish primary data.

The use of low -quality information in the process of making responsible decisions in state authorities, in my opinion, as a citizen of the Russian Federation and a specialist, is unacceptable.

I ask you to take measures to ensure that the Ministry of Education and Science, represented by the Department of Certification of Scientific and Scientific and Pedagogical Workers, disavowed the survey conducted by 5ia LLC and did not use its results.

Sincerely,

[Signature indicating the position and academic degree]

Yuri Ivlev,
doct. Biol. Sciences, Vedas. scientific. sore. Institute of Ecology Problems
and evolution to them. A.N. Severtsov RAS