Still surviving representatives of the older generation remember well those times when young people were taught a very specific specialty in high school and in a higher educational institution. Many graduates, along with a matriculation certificate, received a driver’s license or an electrician’s license. After the institute, a graduate joined the production process or was engaged in scientific research. Today, all educational institutions, regardless of rank, are engaged in training qualified consumers. And who will create products for consumption in Russia? The question is open, and Olga Yuryevna Vasilieva, acting Minister of Education of the Russian Federation, is trying to answer it.
Wunderkind at the music school
When a person chooses a girlfriend for one meeting or in order to spend a vacation together on the shores of the warm ocean, he is interested in the external data of the lady. More information is collected if it comes time to choose a wife. The mistress of the house needs a balanced character, observation, quick wit and high efficiency. When recruiting employees for a particular enterprise, professional training and the presence of certain skills are taken into account. Character features and temperament, if taken into account, then in the extreme case.
One can only speculate about how to choose a candidate for the post of minister to the Russian layman and consumer. By and large - this is not his business. Over the past twenty years, only the lazy did not respond to the quality of education in the country's educational institutions. Of course, there is a real basis for critical judgments and remarks. However, it must be recognized that the process is developing in accordance with the logic of events in the country. All hydrolysis plants operating in the Soviet Union were liquidated. Weaving factories destroyed. This is done in order not to distract people from the consumer process.
What can the Minister of Education Olga Yuryevna Vasilieva change in such a situation? There is no single answer to this question. Having looked at her biography, we can say for sure that she is not a sorceress. An ordinary person who was born on January 13, 1960 in an intelligent family. From childhood, the girl was brought up in work ethics. Father, a mathematician, as was customary in Soviet times, was fond of history and literature. It can be said that he knew the history of his native country through accessible literary sources. It was he who made a significant contribution to the formation of the character and worldview of his daughter.
Expressed in the rough language of the layman, Olga grew up as a child prodigy. At fourteen, she externally graduated from high school. It is important to emphasize that by this age, the girl did not have a clear idea of the future specialty or field of activity. By this time, the family was already living in the capital and the “precocious” graduate entered the Moscow Institute of Culture. Not to say that she was attracted to musical creativity, just this university was located near the house. At the age of 19, Vasilyeva received a diploma of her first higher education. And she went to work as a music and singing teacher in a regular high school.
Scientific career
Three years later, already consciously and in good health, Vasiliev entered the Moscow University for the Humanities, which bore the name of Sholokhov. Learning, as always, is easy. In 1987, having received a diploma of a teacher of history, Olga Yurievna became a graduate student of the Institute of History of the USSR at the Academy of Sciences. Within the walls of this academic institution, her scientific career began. It is very important for a young researcher to choose a topic for a dissertation and an authoritative supervisor. By that time, the perestroika processes had already thoroughly shaken the dogmas of the classical Marxist approach. It became possible to talk about the influence of the church on the worldview of Soviet people.
After a thorough analysis and selection, Vasilieva set about developing a topic on the interaction of the Soviet government and the Russian Orthodox Church during the Great Patriotic War. Earlier, similar topics were only discussed in the scientific community, but Olga Vasilyeva decided to bring the hidden layer of history to the plane of scientific discussion first. Her work was supervised by famous historians and social scientists. The defense of the dissertation went without interference and vulgar accusations of clericalism. And this fact has opened a new direction for research. Vasilieva gives lectures to students, in which she opens previously inaccessible facts and events in relations between the state and the church.
In 1998, Vasiliev defended his doctoral dissertation. Her work on a scientific field was appreciated and two years later she was invited to head the department at the Academy of Public Administration. In parallel with the organization of the educational process, she gives lectures at the Sretensky Theological Seminary. On the advice of her colleagues, in 2007 Olga Yurievna graduated from the Russian Diplomatic Academy. In 2012, she was invited to the Department of Culture of the Government of the Russian Federation by the Director.
