Examiner from an after-school program

Participants of the national project "Education" were tormented by inspections

The hardest thing for participants in the national project “Education” in the first year of its implementation was prosecutorial checks and multi-page reports. Complaints about the time spent on auditors were voiced yesterday during a meeting of the interdepartmental working group on the implementation of a priority national project under the Ministry of Education and Science. In particular, the head of the Moscow Department of Education, Lyubov Kezina, even complained that regular audits are already beginning to interfere with the educational process. Let us recall that the heads of regional education departments made similar claims earlier.

It is noteworthy that the Minister of Education and Science Andrei Fursenko, who had until now convinced his colleagues of the need for strict control over the money of the national project, also agreed that the fiscal authorities had gone too far. “No one doubts that there should be checks, but the expenditure of budget funds is sometimes associated with disproportionate activity of law enforcement agencies,” he noted. And he promised to make a proposal to the Presidential Council for the Implementation of National Projects to streamline and “make the algorithm” for inspections by law enforcement agencies more understandable. “It is necessary that four representatives of control bodies do not jostle each other at school. Such thorough measures lead to disruption of the educational process,” the minister added.

However, despite the hassle of inspections, the participants in the final meeting of the interdepartmental group were satisfied with the work carried out over the year. We managed to meet the deadline with the payment of bonuses to talented youth, although with a slight delay, but still, deliveries of buses and educational and visual equipment for schools began on time, the opening of vocational education centers in military units took place almost hourly, and a program for connecting schools to the Internet is being actively implemented .

The only thing that spoiled the picture a little was the fact that the best schools and universities that won grants from the national project were late in implementing the “business plan.” According to the terms of the competition, they had to spend the first tranche by the end of 2006. However, not everyone managed to purchase equipment on time. However, this problem received an unexpected resolution at a meeting of the Presidential Council for the Implementation of National Projects that took place the day before. Those who spent the last weeks of the outgoing year in fear of losing the second tranche in 2007 and the right to re-participate in national project competitions received an additional three months to use the grant. As the head of the presidential expert department, Arkady Dvorkovich, told reporters following the meeting, “some of the universities did not have time to spend all the funds received, but they will be allowed to do this next year.” The same applies to schools.

Apparently, the curators of the national project simply had no other choice - after all, for example, the mayor of the capital Yuri Luzhkov, having learned that Moscow schools were not meeting deadlines, not only allowed himself to sharply criticize the federal government (the White House is no stranger to this ), but also threatened to return the money back with a scandal. True, the Ministry of Education and Science claims that the federal center transferred money to the regions back in July, and Moscow directors, in turn, complained about bureaucratic delays in extracting money from the national project from city authorities. But in any case, this would spoil the overall rosy picture presented by First Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, who is responsible for all national projects, who said at a meeting in the Kremlin that the Ministry of Education and Science “did not work in vain.” Mr. Fursenko’s department received a good assessment, among other things, because business funds are already being added to the state allocations allocated to the education sector. “On average, participation in co-financing reaches 33-35%. We will use this experience in other places,” Mr. Medvedev noted.

Kirill VASILENKO