Features of marketing research of educational services. Analysis of the market of educational services Analysis of the market of educational services of schools

Romanova Irina Matveevna D. e. Sci., professor, head. Department of Marketing, Commerce and Logistics, Far Eastern Federal University
Elena Noskova to. e. D., associate professor, deputy. head Department of Marketing, Commerce and Logistics, Far Eastern Federal University

Stages of developing a methodological approach to researching the conjuncture of international markets

1st stage. Features of educational services

An educational service is an interaction between a producer and a consumer in the process of providing and acquiring this specific benefit and is the result of scientific and pedagogical work, which is created in order to meet the needs of the consumer.

The specificity of educational services is manifested in a combination of traditional characteristics of services (intangibility, inseparability from the source, inconstancy of quality, non-persistence) and their inherent specific features:

1. the production and consumption of educational services is a rather long process (the full cycle of the formation of a specialist can take 20 years or more, i.e., the consumption of educational services can be carried out throughout life);
2. assessment throughout the training period (sessions, certification);
3. the decision to purchase (acquire) an educational service can be made not so much by a potential consumer as by his parents or older persons;
4. active intellectual participation of the consumer in the process of providing educational services;
5. the consumption of educational services leads to an improvement in the quality of the labor force;
6. from the point of view of the consumer, the remoteness of material benefits at the time of purchasing an educational service;
7. higher cost in comparison with other services, which is a consequence of the higher qualifications of the providers of educational services;
8. satisfaction of the spiritual and intellectual needs of the individual and society, that is, the social need for education;
9. impossibility of resale;
10. the dependence of the acceptability of services on the place of their provision and the place of residence of potential students;
11. competitive nature (this feature is mainly manifested in most state higher educational institutions);
12. relatively young age of consumers of educational services.

Thus, the goods in the educational services market are knowledge, skills and abilities offered by the subjects of this market (universities, private teachers, schools, colleges).

2nd stage. Market research

The composition of the stakeholders of the educational services market is diverse. These are manufacturers, sellers, direct and indirect consumers of educational services, intermediaries, providers, moderators, coordinators. In this market, there are consumers of educational services, payers for educational services, employers, i.e. indirect users of the results of educational activities, institutions and workers in the field of educational services, companies that create elements of educational services (for example, IT companies, publishing houses, other content producers. and technology), the state.

Features of the foreign market of educational services:

1. Education abroad is focused primarily on the self-determination of the student, the identification and development of his inherent inclinations, therefore, higher education abroad is considered more liberal.
2. Practical focus. Foreign universities strive to train exactly the kind of specialists that are required today and will be required tomorrow in the market. Modern education allows you to gain work experience while studying abroad, and by the time you receive your diploma, most students have already been employed. The employment rate of graduates is the parameter that foreign universities are primarily proud of.
3. The quality of education abroad is based on three pillars: the excellent equipment of schools and universities, progressive innovative educational technologies and the rejection of a passive form of education in favor of active independent work.
4. Long-term nature of services. In general, the period of study abroad is 2 years longer than in Russia. Compulsory basic education (from 6 to 7 years), secondary and high school (variability appears, the student chooses the specialization of interest - from 5 to 6 years). Universities and educational institutions of equal status offer 3 levels: bachelor's degree (from 3 to 4 years), master's degree (from 1 to 2 years) and doctor of science (from 3 to 4 years).
5. The flexibility of the entire system of foreign education. Within one country (province, state, region), credits received from similar institutions are recognized in accredited educational institutions. "Credits" act as a unit of accounting for academic workload. Their use is intended to ensure the "transparency" and unity of academic requirements: for example, in order to obtain a degree, it is necessary to collect the number of them required by the educational institution. The widespread use of the credit system ensures exceptional flexibility of the educational process itself, and the mobility of students when moving from one educational program to another or from one university to another.
6. The variety of types of higher education institutions. In particular, in all countries, in addition to universities, there are also "university colleges" - universities with a small number of students (from 2 thousand to 3 thousand versus 20 thousand in an ordinary "full-size" university), specialized higher educational institutions: technological universities , higher schools of economics and management, academies and colleges of fine arts, conservatories. Moreover, the structure of foreign universities includes from 3 to 20 faculties.
7. Intensive development of the non-university sector of higher education. In recent years, the popularity of three-year and four-year tertiary professional schools has been growing, and they are beginning to compete with universities. A shorter study period and a clear professional focus of training increase the demand for graduates from these institutions from industrial and commercial firms.
8. Independent formation of the curriculum by the student. In foreign universities, a wide choice of disciplines is provided, in comparison with the requirements of state standards of the Russian Federation, which can be represented by two options: the first is a free choice, which gives the student the opportunity to choose any discipline from the natural science, humanitarian and socio-economic cycles or a special discipline for deepening professional knowledge; the second is a limited choice, which makes it possible to choose from a certain list of disciplines or fields of knowledge.

The organization of the educational process in foreign countries is carried out using an individual learning trajectory, which provides for the independent choice of students, a list of disciplines required for study, which is ensured by the presence of banks of disciplines in various areas and specializations, which are constantly updated, which makes it possible to adjust the learning process in accordance with the development of new scientific directions and requirements of the labor market.

3rd stage. Development of a market research program

Taking into account the above features of the commodity market, we will develop a market research program (Table 1).

Table 1. Brief description of the stages of the market research program

4th stage. Formation of the main directions of research

The research process involves the search for information in certain areas:

1. Assessment of the state and development trends of the market:
   • The number of students and teachers in primary and secondary education in the APR;
   • the main companies operating in the market;
   • distribution of foreign students studying in higher educational institutions in the APR countries by regions of their origin.
2. Analysis of the product offer on the market:
   • the number of educational institutions in the APR countries;
   • the share of the best universities in the Asia-Pacific countries included in the world Top-ranking;
   • characteristics of educational programs;
   • the cost of educational services for undergraduate and graduate programs;
   • shares of the main recipient countries of the market.
3. Analysis of consumer demand in the market:
   • the number of foreign students in the APR countries;
   • the most demanded specialties in the foreign market.
4. Analysis of prices on the market: minimum and maximum prices for educational services in the context of the Asia-Pacific countries.

After collecting and processing information, you should proceed to the next stage of the program - data analysis and interpretation. For each identified quantitative indicator, you need to build a time series, develop diagrams and graphs.

The developed approach to research will make it possible to assess the state, existing trends in the development of the market, analyze the product supply, consumer demand and the ratio of product supply and consumer demand, and also make a forecast of the market situation based on an assessment of the factors influencing its formation.

5th stage. Designing forms for tabulating data

For the convenience of processing and presenting the obtained data, the collected secondary information will be systematized and processed using the forms presented in Table 2.

Table 2. Growth rates of the number of students and teachers in primary, secondary and higher education in the world and in the APR in the period from 2005 to 2010

To characterize the supply of educational services in the APR countries, we will consider the total number of educational institutions in the APR countries, the number of educational institutions in the field of higher education, which are included in the Top 50 best universities in the world, and also consider the characteristics of the main educational institutions in the educational services market of the APR countries. The tools for characterizing the supply of educational services in the APR countries are presented in Tables 3, 4.

Table 3. Characteristics of the supply of educational services in the APR countries, which are included in the Top / 20 best countries in terms of the quality of school education, 2010

Table 4. Characteristics of the offer of educational services in the APR countries, which are included in the Top / 50 best universities in the world, 2011

To characterize the demand in the market of educational services in the APR countries, let us consider the ratio of foreign students and students studying abroad in APR countries, the distribution of university graduates by field of study, as well as the most paid university specialties (Table 5).

Table 5. Characteristics of demand in the educational services market of the APR countries, 2012

The proposed methodological approach to the study of the market situation for educational services in the APR countries will allow to optimize the research process both in terms of collecting the required information and in terms of its processing.

Approbation of the methodological approach (on the example of the educational services market of the APR countries)

Analysis of the conjuncture of the educational services market in the APR countries

The market of educational services in the countries of the Asia-Pacific region is actively developing. Globalization and economic integration are changing the face of the modern education system. Students have a wide choice of different degrees of education, as well as places and ways of obtaining it. The rapidly developing education markets in China, Singapore and Malaysia have already pushed aside traditional markets in the US, UK and Australia. Today, the sphere of education overlaps significantly with the economic sphere of society's life, and educational activity is becoming an important component of the economic development of countries.

In the market of educational services in the countries of the Asia-Pacific region, the following trends can be distinguished today:

1. Absolute growth in the number of students. From 2005 to 2010, the number of students and teachers in universities increased by 17 and 15%, respectively. At the same time, the highest rates of student enrollment in universities were noted in Cambodia, Hong Kong, Guatemala (an increase of over 50%).
2. Global internationalization and openness of education. The export of educational services over the past decades has become one of the most promising areas for the development of foreign economic relations in the APR countries. Education of foreign citizens is an essential factor in stimulating economic growth. Eight leading recipient countries can be noted, accepting more than 70% of the total array of foreign students: USA (20%), UK (12%), China (7%), Germany (7%), Australia (7%), Canada (5 %), Japan (4%). Malaysia, Singapore and India have also become exporters of educational services and are currently active in marketing in China, Vietnam, Cambodia and Indonesia. India is developing its own regional markets in the Arab countries and the countries of the Indian Ocean basin. At the same time, the balance of forces among the world leaders in attracting foreign students is changing (the shares of the USA, Great Britain and Germany are slightly decreasing, while the shares of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and also Russia are growing).
3. The growth of the mass character of higher education. In the 21st century, higher education acts as a key and fundamental component of sustainable development of the human community. The World Trade Organization estimates that the global higher education market in 2010 is between US $ 50 billion and US $ 60 billion, one fourth of which is in the United States; followed by France, Australia, Canada.
4. The rapid pace of development of the East Asian countries in the field of education. According to a recent report by the Grattan institute, an Australian think tank, East Asia is currently home to the world's best primary and secondary schools that can outperform Western students. The average 15-year-old student in Shanghai knows mathematics at a level two or three years ahead of his peers in the US, Australia, the UK and Europe, according to the report, which is based on data from the Organization's PISA program. economic cooperation and development. In South Korea, primary school spending is less than half of that in the United States, but South Korean students outpace their American peers in reading, math, and science.
5. The growth of information transformation. The Internet and digital technologies force us to reconsider the forms of delivery and assessment of knowledge in the educational process of higher education. The creation of global information networks actually destroyed the borders between states in the field of educational information flows, presented education with a fact when not only educational institutions, but also global information resources became the source of new knowledge and educational information.
6. Diversification and internationalization of higher education. Diversification is associated with the organization of new educational institutions, the introduction of new areas of study, new courses and disciplines, the creation of interdisciplinary programs. Internationalization is aimed at bringing national systems closer together, finding and developing common universal concepts and components in them - the foundations that form the basis of the diversity of national cultures, contributing to their mutual enrichment and stimulating them to achieve high standards.
7. Continuous education among the population of the APR countries. The new type of economic development, which is taking hold in the information society, makes it necessary for employees to change their profession several times during their life, to constantly improve their qualifications. Thus, the literacy rate in the countries of the region among young people in 2005-2010. increased by 2.3 times. At the same time, the highest literacy rate (100%) among the adult population in 2010 is observed in Russia and the DPRK, among the younger generation - in Russia, Brunei, Macau, DPRK, Indonesia, Samoa and Singapore. In an information society, education is closely related to the economic sphere of society's life, and educational activity is becoming an important component of its economic development.
8. Expansion of the influence of the Anglo-Saxon system of higher education according to the scheme of multilevel education. The leadership of the United States in the field of high technologies, fundamental research and education leads to the fact that the multilevel system adjusts national systems to the "bachelor - master - doctor" system. The transformation of national systems is driven by the need to provide an opportunity for local and foreign students to obtain internationally convertible higher education documents and to take part in the expanding process of mobility during the period of study.
9. The growing role of the English language. Since in the Asia-Pacific countries by 2010 the number of foreign students increased by more than 20%, the role of English as the language of international communication increased both among teachers and among students.

In general, the offer on the market of educational services in the APR countries is represented by more than 252 thousand institutions, including more than 200 thousand schools, 32 thousand colleges and 19 thousand higher educational institutions.

The largest number of educational institutions is concentrated in the USA, Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Japan, Russia, China and the Philippines. This is largely due to the fact that these countries are exporters of educational services.

In the Asia-Pacific region, six leading recipient countries can be noted, which host more than 45% of the total mass of foreign students: the USA, China, Australia, Canada, Japan and Russia (Fig. 1).

Figure: 1. Shares of countries accepting foreign students (post-secondary education) in 2010

Table 6. Offer of educational services in the Asia-Pacific countries, included in the Top / 20 best countries for the quality of school education

As for the quality of education in higher educational institutions in the APR countries, it is assessed according to international generally accepted ratings, 2 of which are Asian, 3 are European (Webometrics 2011, ARWU 2011, QS 2011, TIMES 2011, PRSPWU 2011). Since they have completely different assessment criteria, the summary rating allows us to highlight the countries of the world where education as a system is better debugged. The Top-50 countries of the world, where the best universities are located, included 17 countries from the Asia-Pacific region (Table 7).

Table 7. Offer of educational services in the Asia-Pacific countries included in the Top / 50 best universities in the world in 2011

The availability of education in the country is determined by its cost. On average, the cost of education in the best universities in the Asia-Pacific countries, which were included in the Top 50, for 2011 is 6-44 thousand US dollars for foreign citizens (Fig. 2).

Figure: 2. Tuition fees for undergraduate programs for the academic year in the best universities in the Asia-Pacific countries for foreign citizens in 2011

The data show that the highest tuition fees for undergraduate programs for the academic year are in the best universities for foreign citizens - in the USA, Australia, Canada.

Tuition fees for master's programs in Russia and China are the lowest for foreign citizens - from 1 to 10 thousand US dollars (Fig. 3).

Figure: 3. Tuition fees for Master's programs for the academic year in the best universities of the Asia-Pacific countries for foreign citizens in 2011

In terms of the number of students studying abroad, leading positions are taken by China (more than 510 thousand students), South Korea (more than 125 thousand students), Malaysia, France, the United States (more than 50 thousand), Russia, Canada, Vietnam and Japan ( more than 40 thousand).

Globally, the share of international students in 2010 was 58.6% in North America and Western Europe, 20.2% in East Asia and the Pacific, 9.2% in Central and Eastern Europe, 5.6% in the Arab states, 2.4% in Latin America and the Caribbean, 2.3% in sub-Saharan Africa, 1.4% in Central Asia and 0.5% in Southwest Asia.

Among the countries in which students mostly prefer to study, one can name Australia, Japan, Russia, France, the USA and Canada, in total more than 90 thousand people. (fig. 4).

Figure: 4. Shares of the main countries of the Asia-Pacific region by the number of foreign students in 2010,%

The most popular areas of study in Russia are social sciences, entrepreneurship, law (46% of all areas), in Japan - health care, social security (27% of all areas) and engineering, manufacturing, construction (18% of all areas).

In the USA and Australia, the most popular are social sciences, entrepreneurship, law (in the USA - 38%, in Australia - 15% of all areas), healthcare, social security (in the USA - 44%, in Australia - 15% of all areas ).

It should be noted that the educational services market is closely interconnected with the labor market. Therefore, increasing the guarantee of employment after graduation is an important competitive advantage not only for universities in the educational market, but also for states on the world stage.

It should be emphasized that the peculiarity of educational services is manifested in the fact that the beginning of their consumption occurs simultaneously with the beginning of their provision, i.e. supply and demand in the educational services market coincide in time. Thus, the conjuncture of the educational services market in the APR countries can be characterized by the size of the student population in the region (Table 8).

Table 8. Growth rates of the number of students in the APR countries in 2005-2010

Based on the data presented in Table 8, it should be noted that the overall number of students from 2005 to 2010 in the region increased by 2%. Consequently, we can say that the market conditions for educational services in the Asia-Pacific region today are favorable, since there is a fairly stable demand for these services.

In the Asia-Pacific region, as in other regions of the world, processes of strengthening the internationalization of education and the formation of a single educational space are under way. The potential of the region is enormous both in terms of population size and in terms of rates and proportions of socio-economic development.

In part, the insufficient number of national universities has led to the widespread use of transnational forms of education - the import of educational programs from other countries.

Obtaining education abroad is also relevant. In a country comparison by the number of students studying abroad, the leading positions can be noted in the following countries: China (more than 510 thousand students), South Korea (more than 125 thousand students), Malaysia, France, the USA (more than 50 thousand students), Russia, Canada, Vietnam and Japan (over 40 thousand students).

Among the countries in which students prefer to study are Australia, Japan, Russia, France, the United States and Canada. The number of foreign students in these countries is more than 90 thousand people. The largest universities are located in Australia, Canada, China and the USA (the competition is more than 40 thousand students), the university with the largest student capacity is located in the USA - California State University, with more than 140 thousand students.

In general, it should be noted that the educational services market in the Asia-Pacific region is actively developing. Efforts to increase the volume of human capital tend to focus on the young population. The literacy rate of young people today is over 90%. Interest in self-education among the younger generation is steadily growing.

Outcome

Researching the conjuncture of the international commodity market is a complex, laborious process, during which the researcher is faced with a number of problems: firstly, the "language" problem, secondly, the complexity of processing information, which sometimes cannot be brought to a common denominator, and thirdly, cross-cultural differences, fourth, outdated international statistics, etc. The development of a methodological approach at the stage of research planning helps to “smooth out” the above problems, clarifies the setting of goals and objectives, and helps to build research logic.

Within the framework of this article, the authors share their experience in organizing market research on the example of the international educational services market. We hope that the information provided will be useful for both educational specialists and specialists in the field of market research, market participants, specialists engaged in market research, as well as students and undergraduates of economic specialties.

Khuziyatov T. International cooperation in the internationalization of education and science in the APR

Currently, the market for special professional education is actively developing. This also applies to education in the field of stylistics and hairdressing. In this regard, there is a need to use marketing methodology:

- analysis of the professional education market;

- marketing research of education;

- analysis of the marketing environment of educational institutions;

- behavior of consumers of educational services;

- marketing communications in the field of education;

- marketing management in an educational institution.

To begin with, let's define the concept of a hairdresser or a hairdresser-specialist.

The hairdresser, hairdresser-stylist- a specialist in the field of creating a person's style using hairstyles. Among hairdressers, there are the following specializations: specialist in men's haircuts (male master), hair dyeing (hairdresser-colorist), female hairstyles (female master), men's and women's haircuts (universal hairdresser).

In 2010, institutions of primary vocational education graduated 14391 specialists in the profession of "hairdresser", and institutions of secondary vocational education - 2390 specialists in the specialty of "hairdressing". That is, the total number of new specialists is 16781, according to Rosstat.

The main problem is that it is not possible to find out exactly which, public or private, institutions young specialists graduated from. The second main problem is the undefined number of schools and other establishments that produce hairdressers. These issues are not addressed in any official data. Rosstat does not count data on the number of such establishments, which already complicates the study of this market.

There is an order dated April 13, 2010 No. 329 "On the approval and implementation of the federal state educational standard of secondary vocational education in the specialty 100116 hairdressing." In this regard, it is logical to assume that all educational institutions in this profile are licensed and there is a register of these institutions. The Ministry of Education does not have such data.

In a publicistic article where the author Elena Negreskul faced the same problem (to find out the approximate number of schools graduating specialists in hairdressing), it was possible to find out that the Federal Service for Supervision in Education and Science (Rosobrnadzor) reported that the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation entrusted the issuance licenses for educational activities of the territorial districts in which these same educational institutions are located. As it turned out, there were no people interested in the summary data. Therefore, there is no data itself. There is not even data for Moscow and the Moscow region.

For comparison, the statistics of this market are kept in the USA and Europe.

In the United States, primary hairdressing education can be obtained at 1,422 schools and academies, of which 59,208 graduated in the 2011 school year. In Spain, 1067 schools and academies graduate about 30 thousand hairdressers annually.

According to Rosstat, at the beginning of 2010 there were about 70 thousand hairdressing and beauty salons in Russia. That is, in the same year -2010, approximately 16781 graduates of hairdressing salons were supposed to find employment in these salons - one for every fourth salon.

The most traditional path for those who decide to become a hairdresser is to graduate from a public school. State vocational education is already 75 years old, and it lives according to tough laws. In the official documents in force today - the Decrees and Orders of the Ministry of Education of Russia, it is written that in order to obtain the profession of a "universal hairdresser" of the 3rd category, one must study at least 8 months. The pleasure of studying can be extended for 4 years, and then leave the lyceum or college as a 5th grade specialist, "technologist", "technologist with advanced training" or "fashion designer-artist."

In Soviet times, the capital had two hairdressing schools and one technical school. With the restructuring and the subsequent appearance of beauty salons, an acute shortage of personnel suddenly appeared, and government agencies were the first to react to the shortage of specialists, and not of the hairdressing profile - they stopped training masons, and at the behest of the market began to release hairdressers, opening special departments. Not everyone coped with the task brilliantly. Today, a hairdressing state diploma in Moscow is issued by 19 educational institutions, including two construction colleges and a college at the Moscow Institute of Economics, Management and Law. However, the flagships are still the Moscow Art and Pedagogical College of Technology and Design and the College of Service and Tourism 29 (former College of Hairdressing # 315).

In 2006, the Law "On Education" was amended. Traditionally, graduates of schools and lyceums received working professions "hairdresser of the 3rd or 4th category." And colleges and technical schools graduated specialists of a higher class - "technologists", "hairdressers of the 5th category" and "hairdressers-artists-fashion designers". The reform has virtually erased the boundaries - all educational institutions of the pre-university level can provide secondary specialized education.

In Russia, the state trains specialists at three levels on the basis of primary education, secondary education (specialty "hairdressing") and advanced level (specialty "fashion designer-artist").

The training of hairdressers is based on GOSTs - state standards of the profession, which determine what a hairdresser of a certain category should know and be able to do; and the Federal State Educational Standard, a federal teaching standard that determines which subjects should be studied and how many hours are allocated to each. The Federal State Educational Standard is being developed by the Federal Institute for Educational Development (FIRO), attracting experienced specialists from educational institutions of vocational education.

In addition, educational institutions receive regulatory and methodological support - explanations on the formation of sample programs, an approximate schedule and a list of recommended textbooks. The Federal State Educational Standard is a single standard for all state educational institutions on the territory of the Russian Federation, however, 20% of the training time in it is devoted to the implementation of the regional program. This means that the program does not vary much according to the requirements of the regional market.

The state is adjusting its requirements for state standards. The most important adjustment here is the Order of 12 May 2010 of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation N 489 “On the approval and implementation of the federal state educational standard for primary vocational education by profession 100116.01 Hairdresser.

It retains the bit system, but a block-modular system appears, and a new evaluation category appears - "competencies"

The concept of “competence” is disclosed by Lyudmila Nikolaevna Malyugina, head of the department for methodological support of continuous professional training of personnel of socio-economic and humanitarian profiles, UMC PO of the Moscow City Department of Education: “All training is divided into blocks. This modular system was conceived to bring our professional education closer to Western standards. When one part of the training is completed, the student is assessed and found out whether he has enough knowledge, skills and stable skills, how competent he is and can professionally perform a certain type of work. If everything is in order, then, in principle, he may even start working. Then he goes through the next block and is certified that he passed the next level. When all the levels are passed, the state exam is passed, or the state attestation passes and the person receives a category. "

Competence means conformity, there is still no methodology for assessing these competencies, since very subjective qualities are considered.

According to the new federal state educational standards, the state raises the minimum training period for the profession from 8 to 10 months, and the minimum number of hours of training in the profession of a hairdresser - from 1080 to 1424.

The new standards provide for a change in the most important point that evokes criticism of vocational education. In the new edition of the Federal State Educational Standards, practical training should take at least 70% of the study time.

At the moment, practice begins in training workshops. Practice functionality: a teacher looks at the student's work, who explains, corrects, corrects. Also, under the supervision of a mentor, studies take place in other countries. Education is not always limited to the school. For example, in Germany, a person first finds a salon that will take him as a student, and only after that he enters a hairdressing school. The same blended training and hairdressing system in Canada. That is, the student goes through 2 days of school and 3 days of practice in the salon.

Of course, the knowledge of one master is always less than that of a whole team of teachers of a school that has a methodology. In the UK, the practice of personal learning is showing a positive trend. There you can, bypassing the hairdressing school, get a job as an assistant. But the majority still prefer hairdressing schools, of which there are about 13 thousand in the UK.

On the Russian market, there is state professional education, which guarantees state quality, but there is no practice in salons under the guidance of a master of industrial training. While in other countries the educational and work processes are combined from the very beginning, and the practice of parallel work in the salon allows the student of the hairdressing school to confidently master the craft. As a result, at the end of school, the student becomes a full-fledged master.

Hairdressing education market trends.

According to the new programs, more time was devoted to theory, and less to practice, there is no distribution to salons to practice skills.

Thus, after studying, the masters come to the salon not prepared, from the point of view of the employer. Although many educational institutions position themselves as providing all the training centers necessary to get started, they promise to make them a full-fledged specialist for graduation.

In life, there is a gap between promise and reality.

“But at the same time, when they try to“ bring the graduates down to earth ”and send them to learn something else, they are horrified. We studied for three years, bought the instrument, and again! Few realize that without this there is no way, and as a result - a guaranteed conflict with the head of the salon "- Anna Shubina, owner of the beauty salon" Fukko ".

For vocational education, the state guarantee remains attractive to students.

Public education is the benchmark in professional training that all private hairdressing schools are equal to. Therefore, more demands are made on state education.

For example: “Our training center is engaged in advanced training, we teach modern cutting and dyeing techniques,” says Vasily Zakharov, founder of the St. Petersburg-based Vasily Zakharov's Hair Design Studio. - It happens that people carry with them many systemic errors, and this can drag on from high school. For example, a person does not understand the basics of geometry, and as a result, cannot make a tangent cut. And no one is doing this in the future. For some reason, we keep silent that the basics of shaping, the basics of modeling are taught without reference to geometry. "

The problem with organizing practice is that an educational institution needs to attract a sufficient number of models. Otherwise, training will take place on dummies - suitable only for the initial stages. Often educational institutions shift this side of the practice problem onto the students themselves. In other words, students must provide their own practice.

Tamara Mikhailova Ryzhova, director of the College of Service and Tourism No. 29, believes: “In Soviet times, we were attached to the city's hairdressing salons, where the students were practicing. But when hairdressing salons became private, this opportunity disappeared for students. Only due to the fact that we are the oldest college (we have existed since 1968), which has developed great contacts, we were transferred to 5 unprofitable hairdressing salons for training workshops. There is a preferential price list, a haircut costs 90 rubles, and we rent about 1.5 million rubles a year in revenue. "

As for non-state educational institutions, as mentioned earlier, there is no data on the total number of schools for hairdressers.

There are a lot of such schools in Moscow at the moment. This is due to the fact that with a total shortage of personnel for the salon business, the owners of the salons realized that training can be a more profitable business than the salon business itself. Therefore, commercial hairdressing schools open regularly. Among them you can find schools with a good reputation, but there are also fictitious educational institutions.

For non-state educational institutions, the requirements for licensing are less stringent: there are different educational qualifications to which one can “lean against”: primary or additional education.

The purpose of primary vocational education is to train skilled workers, and people who have received it must master the profession in accordance with GOSTs.

The goals of additional professional education can be more abstract: for example, on the website of the Department of Education of the city of Moscow it says: “to master knowledge, skills and abilities, to solve practical problems at a high professional level”. These goals can be realized by a variety of institutions, among which are educational institutions of vocational education or refresher courses. And it turns out that the specific goal depends on what the training centers themselves plan to give. And also from what the students themselves plan to take.

Commercial schools decide on the choice of teaching methodology.

“In theory, any school can buy teaching methods from the Research Institute of Labor, they can be used when opening a school - this approach is suggested by Elena Alekseevna Sokolova. We, of course, wanted to find out how often those who open a hairdressing school use this opportunity. And at the same time, find out how often these teaching methods are updated. But in the register of methods offered by the Research Institute of Labor, “training in hairdressing” does not appear. But at the Research Institute of Labor we were told that today they have nothing to offer in this direction, the old programs developed in the 60s are hopelessly outdated, they have long been removed from the register. Of course, research institutes can develop such a methodology on a contractual basis, but they are not approached with such a request. Non-governmental institutions develop methods themselves, and control over the quality of education, in fact, is shifted to a spontaneous market. "

From the point of view of commercial structures, this situation is very beneficial. That is, in fact, the training centers themselves determine how much the educational process will take, where, and how much it will cost. The type of educational license is also different. And in some cases, the internal standard of schools is very high. For example, the Moscow school "Methods" works under a franchise and trains masters using the PivotPoint method.

Irina Alexandrovna Romanova, Director of the Methodical Training Center, says: “We are obliged to adhere to the strict PivotPoint standard, which we have been doing for 14 years. And the American side - the franchisor, constantly monitors, they can come to us with verification both in the process of training and for exams. It is a pity that in Russia there are generally no such clear standards in the profession, this is a minus of our domestic school for training hairdressers. In Russian schools, you can get a set of independent recipes, if you draw an analogy with cooking. Yes, knowing the recipe, you can make a vinaigrette, but if you don't know the rules of flavor combinations, you won't become a chef in a fusion restaurant. PivotPoint schools teach the whole system, and public college students receive a set of recipes. "

The Western franchise is just one way to open a hairdressing school.

Another is the example of Irina Zaitseva, co-owner of the Avanscene school of stylists: “You can get your primary education in a year, we have“ drained all the water ”, we give only what is necessary, but our requirements are tough. Every student knows: if he has not passed some work, has not passed all tests and certifications, he will never receive a diploma from our school. We are not going to risk our reputation. And in general, we can expel a student if he does not fulfill our requirements. Since in addition to the school we have a salon that gives us financial freedom, we are ready to give up some money, rather than waste energy on someone. "

In commercial education, each subject, each hour, increases the total cost of education. In most cases, the amount that students are willing to pay is the basis for pricing.

For example, the educational center "Premier" promises to prepare a hairdresser in 2 months. The presentation of courses on the site begins with a statement that the market especially lacks masters for VIP-class salons, and ends with a promise of employment in hairdressing salons. They explained by phone that in practice, 2 months of training is not enough, but 3 months are usually enough. In any case, according to the center, it will take no more than six months to study. Although, they add, if you wish, you can and ad infinitum. But even in 3 months they promise to teach how to cut, do styling and perm, as well as give in-depth knowledge of color. The center "has an educational license, teaches according to the state program and issues a diploma with which you can get a job." Price: 6 thousand rubles for the minimum set and 7 thousand for each month of training.

On the website of the EuroStyle-1 training center we find the following proposal: “Hairdresser of a wide profile, training period is 2 months. Upon graduation, a state diploma is issued (in Russian and English). The center's graduates work in Russia and Europe. " In a telephone conversation, they inform that they teach from scratch, but in 2 months you can reach the level “only for yourself” or for an economy class hairdressing salon. For more serious training, it will take from 5 to 9 months, and then you can get several lessons on modeling. It was not possible to find out how much training at EuroStyle-1 costs due to the complex system of announced discounts. There is not a word about the license on the site, as well as about the basis on which a state diploma is issued.

In France, Italy and Germany, they study for at least two years. In Spain, at the Llongueras Academy, training lasts 26 months or 2280 hours. The course of basic training in the British VidalSassoon and Toni & Guy takes quite a long time: in both schools, the theory and direct training in haircutting, styling, dyeing and curling will last 30 weeks.

There is a widespread belief in the Russian market that the profession of a hairdresser can be mastered in a couple of months. Further education courses are being produced by hairdressers hoping to find their place in the market. The owners of salons and hairdressing salons sometimes hire young professionals, but more often the salons still select specialists with experience.

Like many, the BaroN beauty salon does not accept students. Managing director Svetlana Kolevatova says: “After college, everyone has their hair cut according to a template: they seem to have discussed everything with the client, but as a result, the hat comes out anyway. Nobody needs such a haircut today. Maybe lyceums and colleges should invite specialists from AldoCoppola or Dessange at least once a week to teach them how to style their hair in an interesting way. In the meantime ... I see no other way for graduates but to stay on the stream and invest in their further education. "

Salons, especially luxury class, are picky in choosing even experienced craftsmen, a young specialist does not have the opportunity to find a job there. Although, business class salons are not always so categorical. For example, Volifert Studio is open to young people, they can take a new recruit for an internship, and the ZigZag salon is ready to take graduates as students. The NaturelStudio salon even has a unique example, when a graduate served clients on his own in a month. It happens that salon directors apply for graduates to colleges or come to final exams to select the best. This is the case with colleges that are well known. But, even deciding to take a newly-made master, salon owners are aware of the fact that they are at risk: whether they will turn out to be good hairdressers, only time will tell.

Tatiana Kalita, owner of the Cloud Studio: “For the salons of our network, primary education is not enough, we need masters with experience after further training. Novice craftsmen can easily get a job in an economy class salon and it is very good that they give work to new specialists. I am generally for the practice. The more practice and experience, the better the employee is, and in 3 years of continuous work you can get very good practical skills. "

When browsing the Internet, it was found that out of the large 116 Moscow salons, 52 salons will not hire a hairdresser with primary education, 44 may be taken as an apprentice after testing, and only 20 salons will be happy with a new master.

INTRODUCTION

The place and role of any country in the international division of labor, its competitiveness in the world markets of manufacturing industries and advanced technologies depend primarily on the quality of training of specialists and on the conditions that the country creates for the manifestation and implementation of the intellectual potential of the nation. The role of knowledge in economic development is growing rapidly, outstripping the importance of means of production and natural resources. According to the World Bank, physical capital in a modern economy forms 16% of the total wealth of each country, natural capital - 20%, and human capital - 64%. In countries such as Japan and Germany, human capital accounts for up to 80% of the national wealth. Today, value is created by increasing productivity and using innovation, that is, applying knowledge in practice.

The need for the transformation of the Russian education system is objectively determined by the socio-economic changes that have taken place in Russia over the past 10 years. It follows from the need to bring all systems and subsystems of the national economic complex in line with the requirements of restoring lost economic positions and ensuring the transition to a post-industrial society. The main goal of this transformation is to create an educational system in which young generations will acquire skills that are in demand in the labor market and knowledge that will help them to participate productively in the life of a democratic society.

In the transition from an industrial to an information society, the creation and dissemination of knowledge is becoming a key factor. These processes rely heavily on the use and development of the educational system.

In recent years, a number of important government documents have been adopted that determine the prospects for the development of the domestic education system. This is the National Doctrine of Education in the Russian Federation until 2025, and the Federal Program for the Development of Education for 2000-2005, and, of course, the Concept for the Modernization of Russian Education for the Period until 2010, approved by the Government of the Russian Federation in December last year. Economic issues figure prominently in all these documents. And this is natural, since it is their solution in modern conditions that largely determines the effectiveness of the functioning of the education system. The purpose of this work is to analyze the system of educational services in the Russian Federation, identify its main economic problems and determine possible ways to solve them.

1. ANALYSIS OF THE MARKET OF EDUCATIONAL SERVICES IN MODERN RUSSIA

1.1 Investment in education is the most important indicator of sustainable economic growth

The growth of the Russian economy is determined by many different factors: an increase in the amount of resources, an increase in their quality and an improvement in their use. An increase in the welfare of society is impossible without creating conditions for economic growth. This usually requires investment.

To achieve sustainable economic growth, investment in education (i.e., in human capital) is no less important than investment in physical capital. In the United States, each year spent on school raises the worker's overall wages by 10%. Investing in human capital comes at the cost of lost opportunity. Many scholars argue that human capital is especially important for a country's economic recovery because it provides positive externalities to society.

The social benefits of education development are difficult to assess. Better educated members of society are considered to be more informed voters, more law-abiding citizens and bring significant benefits, as the ideas of highly qualified specialists for improving technology become the property of society, which allows everyone to use them. Associated with this statement is the so-called “brain drain” faced by underdeveloped countries. The economic situation of the country, which is left by qualified specialists, may deteriorate. It is investment in human capital and the growth in the value of human labor that become the most important factors in transforming the economy, since human capital can be viewed as a stock that can accumulate and be a source of higher income for society in the future. Education not only allows you to master old, already accumulated knowledge, but also contributes to the acquisition of new knowledge, and also creates conditions for the development of more advanced technologies. Thus, the development of education goes forward and creates the preconditions for future progress.

To analyze the behavior of subjects in the educational services market, it is necessary:

First, to determine the structure of factors that influence people's decision-making about the advisability of getting an education, and, consequently, about the volume of investment in human capital;

Second, consider the factors that determine the behavior of the state in the education market;

Third, to assess the features of the formation of preferences regarding educational services, taking into account the region of Russia;

Fourthly, to define the criterion for structuring education, which is closely correlated with age;

Fifthly, to study the behavior of other economic entities in the education market, which are also potential participants in this market and present demand for educational services.

Under human capital, economists understand the ability of a person, his skills, knowledge, skills. The accumulation of human capital occurs both in preschool age and at school, technical school, university, in retraining or advanced training courses. The methods for researching demand at any level of education or training are the same.

All investments in education are made with the hope of a high return on investment in the future. Therefore, when deciding whether to invest in education, the benefits and costs are compared. The assessment is based on the expectations of all economic actors. Strictly speaking, expected benefits are the main factor in making a decision. In addition, the rate of return from education to society differs from the rate of return to the individual, since the costs and benefits of education for society and the individual are calculated differently.

In order to assess the expected benefits of investment in human capital from the perspective of individuals, it is necessary to identify the factors that influence people's desire to demand education. They can be roughly divided into short-term and long-term.

Long-term factors (priorities):

1) a high level of wages during the subsequent life;

2) great satisfaction from the chosen work throughout life (moral benefits);

3) achieving a higher social status. It is assumed that in modern society it is possible to rise from the bottom to the very top, and this requires only effort. There are so-called "lifts" of social mobility, one of which is education;

4) wide access to more promising, interesting work;

5) the parents' ideas about the future of their children, which is a determining factor in choosing a life strategy due to the traditional system of family education in Russia;

6) the level of education and social status of parents, which influence the orientation of their children (continuity of generations, continuation of the profession of parents). For parents, a child's higher education acts as proof of the viability of the family, the consistency of its material and social resources;

7) choice of profession made by friends or acquaintances;

8) the prestige of a particular type and level of education.

Short-term factors (current priorities):

1) a high assessment of non-market activities and interests that are associated with obtaining education (the process of learning, communication with friends, school or student life);

2) the desire of young men to enter any university in order to postpone military service;

3) the desire of girls to enter the university, caused by the desire to successfully marry.

All other things being equal, the likelihood of admission to a technical school or university of people oriented at the moment is less than that of people oriented towards the future.

Now consider the benefits to society from investment in education. They are above the individual.

The total benefit to the society is calculated excluding the income tax on wages, since the society as a whole benefits from the services provided by taxes. If education is viewed as a certain “signal” for the labor market, the social return on education is that it helps to “sort” workers according to their productivity. The wealth of society as a whole is viewed as a combination of human and material capital. High investment in education increases productivity.

Firms also benefit from investment in education. Educational institutions provide employers with a selection mechanism. Many employers are guided by their diplomas when hiring applicants for work. Perhaps the level and quality of education is a less expensive tool than any other that firms could use.

Benefits to higher education institutions. To maintain and improve its status, the university strives to attract the most talented and efficient graduates of schools and other educational institutions. To identify them, a system of complex entrance tests is being created. This strategy allows you to raise the level of training of graduates, which is an important factor that increases the prestige of this university.

A number of studies conducted in Russia show how expectations are formed regarding the future earnings of school graduates. In particular, they show that the average income earned by recent high school graduates has a strong influence on the decisions of young people and their parents to continue their education or enter the labor market.

According to the results of the VTsIOM polls, differences in wages affect the choice of a future profession and, consequently, an educational institution. Continuing education is an opportunity for good employment, the prospect of good earnings. Striving for education is also associated with striving for career advancement.

Population polls confirm the high desire for higher education. Most of the parents and children are oriented towards higher education. The attitude towards higher education has become a generally accepted norm, practically independent of the social environment of students. There is not only high prestige in all social groups, but also a fairly high motivation to obtain it among the villagers, as well as in social groups traditionally considered socially vulnerable (large families, with unemployed parents, with a low average per capita income).

This main conclusion was confirmed by a representative survey of families in Russia carried out by the Public Opinion Foundation in 2002-2003, in which 9,020 respondents took part. At the same time, 62% of the interviewed respondents had children, 38% did not. 35% of respondents had a higher education among the family members of the respondents, secondary specialized in 26%, secondary technical, vocational school - in 13%, general secondary - in 13%, incomplete higher - in 5%, incomplete secondary - in 5%, primary or lower - 2%, 2% of respondents found it difficult to answer.

In families where parents have higher education, most often they talk about the importance of his education. Less often than others, representatives of those families are convinced of this, the highest educational level in which is secondary general or lower education. The former are 4 times more likely than the latter to declare the “absolute importance” of higher education, as well as their readiness for the material costs of obtaining it by their children. Among the respondents who have such an attitude, managers of various levels and specialists (that is, people who themselves have a higher education or work in positions that require it) are somewhat more common.

Higher education, in the opinion of both high school students and their parents, has become the main and practically the only condition for successful implementation in the labor market, while education in the volume of 9 grades is generally considered less attractive. According to the survey, the families of freshmen officially spent the most of all: on paying for tutoring services (9 times more than the monthly income per family member); to pay for tuition in paid schools or classes (4 times the monthly income per family member); for paid preparatory courses (3 times the monthly income per family member). The amount of informal expenses is approximately 4.5 monthly income per family member.

Parents, believing that the money invested in education pays off, in most cases go to great lengths to give their children a higher education, save money, take a loan from the bank, pay for additional educational services, and give bribes.

Since the expected level of costs affects the decision to invest in education, it is necessary first of all to determine what costs in this case are borne by all agents in the economy.

Individual costs for education:

1) tuition fees and expenses for the purchase of textbooks and stationery;

2) expenses for changing the place of residence;

3) lost earnings, since part of the time is spent on obtaining an additional unit of human capital;

4) expenses for informal (shadow) educational services. These include: the cost of tutors for admission to a prestigious school, university, paid entrance exams, paid preparatory courses, and unofficial assistance in enrolling a child.

The social costs of education to society include:

1) financing of preschool education, the system of general secondary and vocational higher education by the state;

2) costs of the state in the field of higher education. The redundancy of specialists in certain professions in relation to their optimal number increases government spending (for example, on teaching practice, on laboratory research, etc.);

3) the costs of firms for the general professional training of workers.

The main participants in the educational services market, which are in demand for a particular level of education, are:

Families with children;

Firms interested in increasing productivity;

A state whose goal is economic growth and the improvement of the welfare of society;

Higher education institutions interested in enhancing their own reputation.

Let's see how the behavior of all agents in the educational services market changes depending on the level of education.

1.2 Preschool education

Here are the main indicators of the activity of preschool educational institutions in the Republic of Mari El.

The number of preschool educational institutions in 2001 was 285, and at the end of 2004 there were 265. The dynamics shows a decrease in the number of these institutions. At the same time, the number of children in preschool institutions increased from 24.4 thousand (by 29.4 thousand places) to 25.7 thousand (by 28.3 thousand places), which is 61.2% and 66, 5% of the number of children of the corresponding age. In 2001, there were 717 places per 1000 children aged 1-6 years in preschool educational institutions, and in 2004 there were 732 places.

Empirical observations make it possible to study the formation of financial flows at the preschool stage of education. The average annual fee for attending kindergarten is 5,400 rubles. In addition, it should be noted that an important item of expenditure for families is the payment for the services of individuals to prepare preschoolers for the first grade. At this stage of education, an important role, judging by household expenditures, is played by additional educational services - for music, sports, art, dance schools. Families aiming at obtaining higher education for their children, on the whole, spend about the same amount on teaching and upbringing of preschoolers as other survey participants, but they are noticeably more likely than others (26% versus 20% on average for the sample) declare that they are ready to unofficially pay for admission. a child to a “good school”.

The growth in demand for services from private structures is mainly due to the low quality of public services provided by preschool institutions. State institutions are faced with the problem of a lack of personnel, with its low qualifications. The lack of qualified specialists is caused by insufficient funding of preschool institutions. The average monthly nominal accrued wages in these institutions amounted to 2,406 rubles in 2004, and the average subsistence minimum per capita in the same year was 2,200 rubles.

The poor material and technical base of preschool institutions influences the choice of parents in favor of increasing costs for private services: many preschool institutions require major repairs, and some are in disrepair.

Thus, the potential demand for the services of preschool educational institutions includes not only the demand for the services of state, but also private institutions, which can satisfy the great needs of parents in this type of educational services. Public preschool institutions do not always meet the requirements of parents of preschoolers.

1.3 General education

The school system lays the foundation for the overall formation of future qualifications. And here, from the point of view of the needs of the economy, several general tasks are seen.

The first challenge is the content of the teaching programs themselves, which should reflect significant changes in economic life. This type of education should lay the foundation of knowledge that can be used in any subsequent career option. Already at this stage, the first place comes to the development of creative abilities and talents, familiarization with various professions and mastering the skills of information technology as the general basis of modern education and business.

The second task is the quality of teaching, which in turn must meet the realities of life, modern technology and social needs and which depends on the prestige and status of teaching work, its remuneration, conditions, and the level of training of the teachers themselves. In many countries, teachers are now increasingly knowledgeable about the labor market and economics, and many of them have become teachers after having gone through other professional careers.

The third and most difficult task is effective teaching of children and adolescents. After all, shortcomings in the implementation of the first two tasks lead to the formation of a "risk group" consisting of non-competitive workers, yesterday's schoolchildren, the least prepared for active creative work.

The education system, working for the reform of Russian society, should pursue the goal of a fuller satisfaction of the needs for educational services on the part of both an individual and society as a whole. The emergence of a wide range of educational services, as well as the availability of educational institutions of various forms of ownership, create a healthy competitive environment, which contributes to improving the quality of educational services provided and their targeted consumption.

According to statistics, the number of general education institutions in Mari El decreased from 415 in the 2001/2002 academic year to 348 in the 2005/2006 academic year, and the number of students (at the beginning of the academic year) - from 112.9 thousand to 82 thousand, respectively. In other words, the number of general education institutions decreased by about 16%, and the number of students - by almost 27.5%.

The process of closing state daytime primary institutions in the republic is most intensive (from 96 to 58), less intensive in secondary (complete) schools (from 219 to 195) and in basic general education institutions (from 86 to 80). In educational institutions for children with disabilities, the situation is practically stable.

Many buildings of public daytime general education institutions require major repairs. In a number of places, schools, especially primary ones, are housed in buildings that are not suitable for working with children.

A characteristic feature of the school network is the presence in it of a large number of small and small schools. In such educational institutions, teachers have to combine the teaching of many subjects. Small schools are less well equipped with technical teaching aids, laboratory equipment, and visual aids. One of the reasons explaining this situation is the low level of wages: in 2004, the average monthly nominal accrued wages in daytime general education institutions amounted to 3111 rubles. A serious problem in educational institutions is the aging of the teaching staff, the lack of young recruits. The school is supported by teachers of middle and retirement age, as a result of which there is a certain conservatism in the knowledge of schoolchildren. Young professionals do not go to work at school.

These facts lead to a decrease in the quality of education, which varies significantly from school to school. The presence of lyceums and special schools makes it possible to maintain a fairly high level of education in certain strata of society, but for the most part the level of secondary education has dropped.

Paying directly for educational services for schoolchildren is not among the most common areas of investment. Payment for additional classes in basic subjects - the most demanded of such services - ranks only 9-10th in the list of costs associated with the education of a student, and is in demand in 11% of families. The same number of parents pay for the child's classes in circles and sections. About 8% of families pay for preparing a child for admission to a secondary specialized or higher educational institution. Only 5% of families noted the official payment for the education of a child at school.

The results of the survey indicate that families aimed at obtaining higher education for their children, unlike others, at this stage of the educational process are concerned about the progress of their children. In this group of families, the costs of preparing children for the school curriculum, as well as paying for their lessons with private teachers, are about a quarter higher than the average for the sample. At the same time, parents estimate the costs of tutoring and full-time courses as high, but necessary in order to increase their child's chances of admission.

The greatest investment is required for obtaining a higher education, and parents are forced to both pay for preparation and admission to a university, and monthly during the entire period of study to allocate a significant share of family income for educational needs.

The population thinks that the level of state secondary education is insufficient. According to parents and schoolchildren, a very important indicator of the quality of school education is admission to universities, namely, the number of students of a given school (or class) who have managed to enter universities. What is expected from the school is not education in general, not knowledge in general, but the knowledge that is needed to prepare for entering a university. Meanwhile, the facts show that the school does not provide the knowledge sufficient for entering the university. Differences and inconsistencies in the programs of the school and university cause serious difficulties for applicants.

In fact, most families are already paying for university entrance fees. A student who graduates from a regular school has almost no chance of going to university without additional effort. Training in preparatory courses, classes with tutors become completely inevitable. The item of expenses for admission to a university should also include paid entrance exams, paid paperwork, payment for a hostel for the time of exams, for renting private housing for the period of exams, for books, textbooks, photocopying of materials for preparing for a university and for other needs.

Access to higher education is strictly differentiated depending on the type of secondary education that boys and girls graduate from. Graduates of general education schools to a much greater extent (up to 90%) are oriented towards universities, while among graduates of secondary vocational schools and vocational schools there are no more than 1/5.

Education, which allows you to take advantageous social positions in the future, is much more accessible to those whose parents are able to provide education in a good school, pre-university training, education in a prestigious university, etc. In such a situation, high-level education and prestigious professions are increasingly becoming the privilege of wealthier families.

1.4 Initial vocational education

The peculiarity of the market for vocational education services at all levels is its heterogeneity. It includes many segmented, interconnected markets that are formed under the influence of various circumstances: the level and stage of education, the type of educational institution, the profile of training, the nature of the specialty, gender, age, marital status and other factors.

Primary vocational education is the least in demand in comparison with specialized secondary and higher education. Throughout the entire period of socio-economic transformations, there has been a gradual decrease in both the number of educational institutions that train specialists with appropriate qualifications and the number of students in them. If in the 2001 academic year 13,100 students were enrolled in 32 institutions of the primary vocational education system in the republic, then in the 2004 academic year there were 9,500 students per 23 institutions. The overwhelming majority of children from families with low and below average incomes study at vocational schools.

If school education of a child requires financial investments from almost all parents (only 8% of parents of schoolchildren stated that they do not do such), then obtaining vocational primary education, as shown by the survey results, is only from two-thirds (about 30% of families in which there are student of vocational school, did not mark any type of corresponding costs). At this stage of education, the largest number of families (40%) bear the cost of purchasing office supplies. A quarter of the respondents noted the purchase of textbooks and educational supplies as an expense item. Families of vocational schools are much more likely than parents of schoolchildren to pay official tuition fees, but much less often they spend on additional educational services.

The demand for vocational primary education services is extremely low. Apparently, the plans of adolescents and their parents regarding education in vocational schools are influenced by the further employment of graduates of these institutions. Distinctive features of the representatives of this socio-demographic group are their low competitiveness in the labor market due to the lack of sufficient qualifications, work experience and practical work experience. When hiring, discrimination is possible regarding the remuneration of this category of workers. With a massive reduction in the number of personnel at many enterprises, it is the recent graduates of vocational schools that are subject to priority reduction. In addition, the level of education received, adaptation to the changing situation on the labor market, as well as the situation in a particular vocational school have a great influence on the position of vocational school graduates. In addition, it is necessary to take into account the psychological side of this problem. Young specialists who have entered the labor market and have not found a worthy application on it tend to consider themselves "thrown overboard", useless to anyone. given the specifics of youth instability, instability of the nervous system, uncompromising, can lead to irreversible social consequences.

To change the situation, a clear program is needed to regulate the problems considered. There is an objective need of society for workers. It is necessary to implement measures that will lead to an increase in the role of vocational primary education, which is a step in the system of continuous education and a multi-level system of training specialists.

1.5 Specialized secondary education

The system of secondary specialized education is designed to train workers in broad specialties that are in demand on the labor market. The income level of families entering secondary schools is low and below average. Most of the college students are the children of workers, office workers and technical specialists.

The higher the level of education of family members and the level of its income, the higher the total annual cost of training a child in a secondary school. The highest tuition costs in this case are tuition fees in paid colleges. The costs of lessons with tutors under the secondary school program are one third lower and the cost of renting housing for secondary school students is another third. The higher the education level of family members, or their job status, or the level of family income, the higher the cost of educating a child in a secondary school. It should be noted that there are no significant differences across regions and types of settlements for this indicator. At present, there are 13 colleges in Mari El (14 in 2001), in which 14.2 thousand students study (11.8 thousand in 2001).

1.6 Higher education

Higher education in the modern period has found itself in a very difficult situation, due primarily to the transition to market relations in the field of education, including the reduction in budgetary funding for higher education institutions and the rejection of the mandatory state distribution of graduates. In the context of a decrease in financial receipts from the budget, universities are forced to look for new sources of funding; the most obvious source is the introduction of tuition fees, the formation of commercial faculties, departments, courses. In addition, universities are willing to lease their premises and territories, reduce the cost of purchasing new equipment and staffing. Such changes cannot but affect the educational process and the quality of training of specialists.

Fundamental changes in the system of employment of graduates demanded that universities develop emergency measures: in the absence of a system of state distribution of graduates, in order not to lose applicants, the university needs to provide, if not guarantees, then at least hope that the graduate will find a suitable job. This means that the university must provide a specialty that is in demand on the labor market, provide education that allows it to adapt to market requirements, and provide services to promote the employment of a graduate. Only if these conditions are met, the reputation of the university will be able to withstand the tough competition of enterprises, organizations, firms and educational institutions for a young person who determines his life choice and maintain his own existence in a market economy.

The data on the movement of finances obtained in the course of the implementation of the project "Formation of a system for monitoring the economy of education" show that paid higher education in modern Russia occupies equal positions in comparison with officially free ones. In recent years, household expenditures for students in paid departments have been growing, and for students in budgetary places, they have been decreasing.

The highest costs are required for studying at a university: almost 20% of families invest 3 thousand or more rubles in it every month, another third - from 1 thousand to 3 thousand rubles. The total costs of families for students studying on a paid basis exceed the costs of students studying at the budgetary department, approximately 3 times.

The main problem with the employment of university graduates is that the growing demand for higher education is inadequate to the number of jobs with relevant qualifications in the economy. If in our society, as in countries with developed market economies, a higher level of education would give greater guarantees of good employment and a high standard of living, would provide protection against unemployment, then perhaps the demand for a higher level of education would increase. One of the paradoxes of the situation in Russia is that the remuneration of specialists did not correspond (and even now does not always correspond) either to the costs of their training or to the level of their requirements. This discrepancy led to the emergence of an unjustifiably large number of specialists with higher education, working in working positions and generally not in their specialty.

The need for educational services as a public good is expressed through the mechanism of public choice, in the form of decisions made: to enter this or that educational institution, to this or that faculty, to the corresponding prestigious educational institution. Such a need strongly depends on the opinions of parents and friends. It can be restrained by the rules of admission to an educational institution, the level of requirements for the quality of knowledge of applicants, and can also be deformed by the corresponding policy of state support for students.

The need for higher education is acquiring a pronounced social connotation, since higher education is viewed as a symbol of the highest consumer standard and the way of life of the middle class. Higher education also realizes the growing social needs of people in their further spiritual and intellectual development. The need for higher education depends on the scale of development of other levels of education and the quality of training at the previous stages of education. A so-called "internal educational market" is emerging, where the quality of education plays the role of a kind of "currency".

The peculiarity of educational services is that the effect that a person and society receives is difficult to quantify. The uncertainty of the final results of the qualitative aspects of education creates difficulties for students:

In the right choice of training profile and specialty, for teachers

In a reasonable selection of students, and for enterprises - in a rational recruitment of specialists (an employer often takes time to recognize a new specialty).

Another feature of educational services is the high elasticity of demand for them. Consumers of education services can deliberately cut their spending in favor of other consumer budget items. After a compulsory education system (for example, at a university), consumers of services often have to compare the costs of studying with “lost income”, ie. with the income that they would have received by working in the national economy during their studies. The factor of “lost income” is taken into account by the theory of human capital in the formulas for determining the comparative effectiveness of training in various types of educational institutions.

The service market for the system of vocational training and advanced training of personnel is connected, on the one hand, with the labor market, and on the other, with the market for scientific and technical products and the investment market. The imbalance between the structure of training and the needs of the economy, both in workers and in specialists, in the context of the transition to market relations, complicates the employment of graduates of educational institutions. In mitigating the imbalance in the structure of the labor force and jobs, the main role belongs to the mobility of the educational system as a whole, and especially the vocational education system. This is achieved primarily due to the quality of education, which ensures the adaptation of workers to market requirements.

It should be borne in mind that the market of professional educational services plays an active role in the formation of promising employment, solving the problem of retraining workers who have found themselves out of work due to the structural restructuring of the economy and scientific and technological progress.

At the same time, the issue of the market for highly skilled labor and the adequate response to it of the education system has its own socio-economic content. The presence of "superfluous" people with diplomas, which, in the conditions of the transition to the market, are not in demand, raises questions both for the state and for the vocational education system about changing the forms and methods of their training. The market of educational services, adapting to the labor market, has its own characteristics, due primarily to the fact that education is largely a public good.

The consumers of educational services are individuals or groups of students at the same time. Payment for educational services is carried out either directly by their consumers, or by enterprises, organizations (sectoral funding of educational institutions) and the state (budgetary funding). Until recently, payment for educational services in our country was carried out mainly by the state. Consequently, the state is a double monopoly in education: both in the production of educational services and in their consumption. This means that the solution of all the main problems of education often depends on the state apparatus: who, what and how to teach and how much resources to allocate for this.

2. ECONOMIC PROBLEMS OF THE SYSTEM OF EDUCATIONAL SERVICES AND POSSIBLE WAYS OF THEIR SOLUTION

The main complex of economic problems of the education system is associated with a sharp deficit in budgetary financing of the industry and insufficient elaboration of the sectoral economic mechanism. The operating mechanism in education does not ensure the priority of taking into account the strategic interests of the nation, the interest of educational institutions in improving the quality level of teaching and educational work, protecting the rights of educational institutions in their relations with founders and government bodies, the optimal distribution of economic resources between territorial educational systems and within them ...

Analyzing the financial resources that ensure the development of the education system, it should be noted that at present the state allocates almost 600 billion rubles to the Russian education system, or 4% of GDP.

The expansion of budgetary financing of education has the following possible parameters and limitations:

An increase in its share to 6.2% of GDP by 2005 will increase budgetary financing of education by 1.6 times, and by 2010 - by 2.1 times. It is planned to ensure the outstripping growth of federal budget expenditures on education: from 32 billion rubles. in 2001 up to 135 billion rubles. in 2005 and 240 billion rubles. in 2010;

Development of an expenditure planning system within the framework of a two-sector budget model: the first sector - provision of budgetary financing standards per student, pupil; the second sector is the formation of a budget for the development of educational institutions that play a key role in the development of the entire education system or in the execution of the "innovative order" of the state, as well as funds for informatization and equipment renewal; an increase in the share of these funds in the consolidated education budget up to 5% in 2005 and 10% in 2010, in the federal budget - up to 15 and 20%, respectively. State investments in educational institutions will be carried out mainly in the form of co-financing of projects selected on a competitive basis. This will help mobilize extrabudgetary funds from educational institutions;

Structural maneuver of resources within the education system. The real economic independence of educational institutions, the transition to normative funding per student, pupil, restructuring of the network of rural (small-class) schools can provide internal savings in the amount of about 15% of existing funding through regional and local budgets (30 billion rubles in 2005 .). The redistribution of the responsibility of the federal and regional budgets in relation to institutions of primary vocational education will increase their funding in 2004 by about 5 billion rubles;

The existing mechanism of subsidiary responsibility of higher budgets for the fulfillment by lower budgets of state obligations and guarantees, including in the field of education, is not divided by types of responsibility, is not transparent for control, and does not create incentives for lower budgets to fully mobilize funds for the fulfillment of federal mandates. To eliminate these shortcomings, within the framework of the reform of subsidiary responsibility of budgets, it would be possible to switch to a transparent system of targeted subsidies for education for subsidized regions. This measure can be supplemented by a stimulating mechanism for the formation of such subventions, in which a subsidized region, which increases the share of its own funds for education and increases the efficiency of their use, would receive an increased transfer over the next year. As a result, the real expenditures of territorial budgets on education may grow at a faster rate than GDP growth, and their share in the budgets will increase significantly.

The problem of mobilizing private funds in the education system is quite acute and debatable, which is currently facing serious restrictions due to the low income of more than 70% of Russian families. According to available indirect estimates, today only 25-30% of families take part in financing the education of their children. The proportion of families showing an interest in investing in education grows as their children complete general education and peaks by the 10th and 11th grades of secondary school.

It is assumed that as the real income of the population grows, the share of families able to invest in education may increase by 2010 to 40-45%. At the same time, families belonging to the 5-7th income deciles will be able to invest only very limited funds in education - from 3 to 10 thousand rubles. in year. It is possible to take these funds into account and coordinate their use with the execution of federal and local education budgets by linking them with personified state funding as voluntary and transparent additions to such funding.

Taking into account the introduction of incentive mechanisms for budget financing, tax incentives for private investment in education (in particular, a decrease in the tax base taking into account the costs of education) and the growth rate of income by 2010, it is possible to predict a significant increase in funds coming to the education sector from families.

Large reserves are also contained in the organization of the effective use of funds of the business community as the main consumer of qualified personnel. Today the funds of enterprises (approximately 10 billion rubles in 2000) that go into the education sector can be conditionally divided into two streams. The first is to pay for those educational programs in which the enterprises themselves are interested (mainly short programs of additional vocational education and training of personnel in secondary and primary vocational educational institutions); the second is sponsorship funds.

The demand from enterprises for educational services may increase as the real sector of the economy revives. With relatively balanced growth rates across sectors, one can expect an increase in demand for education on their part by 4-5 times. An additional effect can be provided by the introduction of tax incentives (crediting all education costs to the costs of producing goods, works and services and excluding sponsorship funds from the tax base). It is predicted that sponsorship funds will grow at a slower pace, their volume by 2010 may amount to no more than 10-15 billion rubles. Taking into account orders for research and development and R&D, the volume of funds of enterprises entering education may amount to 50-60 billion rubles. (0.5% of GDP).

Additional incomes of the education system are formed from commercial, non-educational activities (sale of their own products by universities, vocational schools and technical schools, renting out premises of educational institutions, etc.).

When looking for ways to solve the above problems, it is necessary to take into account the sharp demographic changes. So, if until 2003 there was still an increase in the release of students from general education schools, then in 2004-2008. there will be a sharp decline in the number of students in general education schools, and from 2008 this process will fully affect higher educational institutions.

The resources for the development of the education system include such new institutional phenomena, some of which are being tested experimentally as part of measures to modernize education, such as:

Personification of budget financing, which consists in a combination of normative financing per student and differentiated personified budget financing of students within the framework of state guarantees for obtaining education, which can be carried out in various forms (educational subsidies, personal financing, etc.), depending on related goals and tasks solved by the state in the development of the education system;

The introduction of tax incentives for private investments in education, providing for a reduction in the taxable base of income tax on expenses for payment for educational services, exemption from taxation of charitable donations for the development of education, a reduction in the taxable base of legal entities on income tax by including expenses for training or retraining of personnel in composition of production costs.

Another no less important prerequisite for the development of the education system is the formation of the academic and financial independence of educational institutions, that is, the full and consistent implementation of the legal status of an educational institution, as reflected in the RF Law "On Education". It is in the field of education, based on the accumulated experience of the economic and academic autonomy of universities, that it is possible to work out new economic principles for the functioning of all organizations in the socio-cultural sphere. These principles include:

Gradual equalization of the rights of state and non-state educational institutions that have state accreditation;

Contractual forms of relations with the state and private customers, including with direct recipients of educational services;

State accreditation and public state system of education quality control;

The transition from the allocation of funds by items of expenditure of the budget classification to financing by one indicator (performance of the state registered financial obligation);

Expansion of the rights of educational institutions to manage financial resources (in general education - with the participation of boards of trustees);

Granting educational organizations the right to independently approve the cost estimate and, accordingly, change it;

Transparency and accessibility for public and state control of all financial activities of an educational organization, including the development of unified reporting forms and the annual publication of financial reports;

Creation of easy-to-execute, unified and understandable procedures for spending funds based on a competitive selection of suppliers of goods, works and services;

Effective use of real estate transferred by the owner to the educational institution for statutory purposes, guaranteed exclusion of the possibility of withdrawal from the educational sphere of property objects assigned to state and municipal educational institutions. The approval of these approaches will not only extend to all educational institutions the principles of freedom of academic and economic organization, which made it possible for Russian universities to survive in the 1990s, but also eliminate the contradictions between the budget and economic independence of such institutions.

From the listed prerequisites and resources for the development of the education system, it is clear that in the management of its development, along with the substantive issues of education that are under the jurisdiction of pedagogical science, management by reorganizing and improving economic relations in education is of great importance. Today, it seems expedient to reorganize economic relations in the general education system, which involves the separation of budgetary funding for educational institutions, institutional funding (i.e., direct funding of educational institutions from budgets of all levels) and budgetary funds coming into the system from students. This means that educational institutions are financed from the budget in proportion to the number of students (regulatory funding) in the amount ensuring the conditions and volume of the provision of educational services necessary to implement the minimum requirements of the federal and national-regional components of the state educational standard. The budgetary funding norm is guaranteed and fixes the minimum amount of financial resources per year per student, ensuring the realization of citizens' rights to free general education. Additional educational services outside the standard are paid for all students. For students from low-income families, these costs must be fully or partially reimbursed in the form of social support.

This approach will help stabilize the economic situation of the system of general education institutions, strengthen guarantees for the implementation of the constitutional rights of citizens to receive education, streamline the attraction of funds to the education system.

To activate these mechanisms, it is necessary, in addition to introducing normative budgetary financing of general education institutions, to streamline the existing interbudgetary relations, introduce a mechanism of two-tier budgetary financing and transfer state powers in the field of education with appropriate resources to a lower budgetary level, move from a system of impersonal and unprotected transfers to subventions and subsidies. for subsidized regions and municipalities.

CONCLUSION

Obviously, the Russian education system is still mostly overly theorized and poorly focused on practical application, not flexible enough in modern conditions. For example, in most cases, after receiving a diploma of higher education, a person has to bear additional costs (material, temporary) for retraining, that is, the effectiveness of investments in human capital in a number of Russian educational institutions can be questioned. At the same time, there is a shortage of specialists in a wide range of areas, as evidenced by, for example, a significant increase in recent years in the number of foreign managers in a number of companies whose development strategies are focused on international standards.

According to the Concept of Modernization of Russian Education until 2010, approved by the Government on October 25, 2001, education is supposed to be reformed in two stages:

1. At the first stage (2001-2003), it is necessary to fully restore the responsibility of the state in the field of education, with the achievement of the minimum necessary budgetary standards, and the solution of socially significant problems. The modernization of education is developing and taking place in the context of the general process of reforming various aspects of life, in close interaction with other reforms, at the same time being a source for them to provide the necessary human resources.

2. At the second stage (2004–2005), measures are to be fully implemented, in particular those that were experimentally tested at the first stage and received support after evaluating the results, to introduce new models of educational content, organization and financing. In the course of the second stage, the resource provision of education will be expanded, primarily from the budgets of all levels.

3. In 2006–2010. the first results of education modernization should appear:

o growth of its resource availability;

o real improvement in the quality of general and vocational education;

o reduction of social tension in society;

o on the basis of an increase in the salary of educators, the growth of social status and improvement of the qualitative composition of the teaching corps, its rejuvenation will be ensured;

o increasing the competitiveness and investment attractiveness of vocational education as a result of updating the material and technical base and adaptation to labor markets.

We can say that the problem of education reform falls into two main areas:

1. Reform of the educational process;

2. Reform of the system of remuneration of workers in the public sector.

Conclusion: Of course, Russia needs an education reform. Under the existing system, one cannot count on a significant increase in human capital, which, in principle, determines the prospects for the development of the entire economy. Scientists of the world have already come to the conclusion that the most important resource of the economy is the human resource, the possession of which on a national scale determines its position in the world. Of course, the factor of using this resource is also important, that is, to what extent the state can give people the opportunity to realize the accumulated potential. However, if this potential is wasted, its restoration can take years, and the first problem can be solved in a much shorter time. Thus, if the Government does not act in this direction, Russia's competitiveness in the world will decrease annually.

According to the General Director of the Russian Economic Society, Denis Mukhanov, education reform, first of all, should be carried out in the context of a radical improvement in quality, namely, who teaches and how in Russian educational institutions, to what extent it is applicable in real life and corresponds to the realities of today. Why, given the vaunted quality of our education, do citizens continue to send their children abroad?

So, the reform of the Russian education system should consist of the following measures:

1. A sharp increase in salaries and toughening requirements for teachers. We need a tough re-certification of the teaching staff, as a result of which 10–20% of them will lose the right to teach, the involvement of specialists for teaching from real sectors of the economy;

2. Fight against corruption in the teaching and teaching environment;

3. Investments in the material base of education (buildings, sports facilities, computer equipment, etc.);

4. Improvement of teaching methods, taking into account specialization, evaluation of textbooks by independent specialists, radical reform of the system of teaching foreign languages;

5. Talking about school - the return of discipline. No one wondered why, for example, there is always a school uniform in the most prestigious schools abroad?

Thus, we are not yet talking about a full-fledged reform of education. Russia loses in the preparation of young people, and the breadth of outlook of its best students does not compensate for this. A weak school is equivalent to a weak state.

LITERATURE

1) Balykhin G.A. Topical issues of socio-economic development of the education system in Russia // Education Economics. 2004. No. 3.

2) Bethlehem A.B. Problems of reforming the remuneration system in education and the economy of knowledge // Economics of education. 2004. No. 3.

3) Davydova E.A. Analysis of the market of educational services in modern Russia // Economics of Education. 2004. No. 5.

4) Eroshin V.I. Economics, law and education management: problems, research, solutions // Bulletin of the Russian Academy of Education. 2002. No. 2.

5) A.V. Usova Problems of reforming the education system // News of the Russian Academy of Education. 2002. No. 2.

7) Economics of education in the mirror of statistics // Economics of education. 2005. No. 5

8) Official website of the Russian Economic Society: http://www.ress.ru/

9) Republic of Mari El in figures // Statistical collection. Yoshkar-Ola. 2006.

10) Social status and standard of living of the population of r. Mari El // Statistical collection. Yoshkar-Ola. 2005.

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Education is an important sphere of society, which should be a priority in the development of the state, since it ensures the country's social stability, its national security, competitiveness and economic growth. The goal of the state in the field of education is to increase its accessibility in a modernized economy. Today, the state in the field of education is faced with the tasks of ensuring the availability of high-quality general education, improving the quality of vocational education, developing a modern system of continuous vocational education, as well as increasing the investment attractiveness of the education sector. Marketing in the field of education plays a very significant role in the market economy, as it helps to form and develop the demand for goods and services, optimize their supply, develop and implement the most effective strategies for the activities of market participants. The Constitution and the Law of the Russian Federation "On Education" proclaim the priority of the sphere of education, which is one of the most rapidly growing and promising spheres of the economy. Any educational institution is faced with the task of finding new approaches to solving complex economic problems, for example, such as increasing the efficiency of using the institution's funds, searching for new sources of funding, and mainly, improving the activities of educational institutions in general. With limited public resources allocated to education, a lack of sponsorship for the introduction of new programs, and a noticeable trend towards the emergence of alternative educational institutions, marketing helps educational institutions to take their place in the educational market, cultivating a special mission of each educational institution

The specificity of the marketing of educational services is partly manifested as the specificity of services as such, partly as the specificity of scientific, intellectual services. The need to systematize information about the educational market lies in the fact that earlier in economic theory, individual provisions were considered that determine the content of the education market and its features. Given the classification of commodity markets, the educational services market is an integral part of the market for spiritual goods, which in turn is a kind of commodity market. The educational services market is a kind of product market, and its main element is educational services. A service is a special form of a product offered to the market and consisting of an activity that benefits the consumer by satisfying his needs. According to F. Kotler, a service should be understood as a variety of activities and commercial activities. The following features are inherent in services: intangibility, inseparability from the source, inconsistent quality, non-persistence. In the system of the educational services market, the conventional image of a product is being transformed, acting in the form of an educational service. Let us consider in more detail the properties of educational services (see Table 1).

Educational services are the result of useful activities of various types of educational institutions (preschool, general education, primary, secondary, higher and postgraduate education institutions), as well as educational entities aimed at meeting the needs of the population and society.

Table 1 - The main characteristics of educational services in relation to

education

Service property	Characteristic
Intangibility	An educational service is not tangible, it is impossible to see, try, hear it until the moment of purchase. A student will not be able to see the result, let alone assess the quality of educational services, until he enters an educational institution and completes it.
Inseparability from the source	A service cannot be separated from its source, while a material product exists regardless of the presence or absence of its source. With regard to an educational service, a service is the transfer of new knowledge. Without the presence of pupils or students, the teacher / teacher cannot provide the service.
Impermanence quality	The quality of educational services varies widely depending on the conditions, time and place of its provision. The inconsistency of the quality of the service is due to the presence of the human factor. The educational service depends on the character traits of the teaching staff, their qualifications, as well as information and technical support of the educational process
Non-preservation	An educational service cannot be saved for future use. The lack of preservation of educational services is associated with the fact that over time a person simply forgets the information received, and knowledge is gradually becoming obsolete, becoming less relevant in connection with scientific, technical and social progress.

Education is a leading branch of the social sphere that affects the quality of life of a person and society. The provision of educational services is carried out by both state educational institutions and private ones. It should be noted that due to the unfavorable demographic situation in the country, which led to a sharp decrease in the number of applicants, there was an increase in competition in the educational services market (see Table 2). On the one hand, in three age groups (from 0 to 4 years old; from 5 to 9 years old; from 10 to 14 years old), a positive trend has been observed over the last five years. However, for the period under review 2011-2016. in the age group from 15 to 19 years, there is a decrease in numbers every year. The maximum decrease in the number of potential students (by 7.36%) occurred in 2012, when their number decreased by 606 thousand people. compared to the previous year. In these conditions, the rivalry between educational institutions for a potential consumer is increasing.

The study of the market of educational services is one of the priority areas of marketing activities. It includes market segmentation, market analysis, competitor identification and other elements. The main objects of segmentation are educational services themselves, consumers and organizations providing these services.

According to Rosstat, in 2016, there was a process of improving the higher education system in the Russian Federation, which was aimed at increasing the efficiency of the activities of organizations engaged in educational activities, as well as improving the educational system by consolidating (merging) educational organizations in order to optimize budget expenditures. Analyzing the state of the Russian market of educational services for higher education in the sector of public and private organizations, it should be noted that the total number of educational institutions for the period from 2011 to the present has decreased by 17%, and the decrease in the number of educational institutions occurred in both state and non-state sectors (see Table 3). Thus, the total number of educational institutions of higher education in 2016 compared to 2015 decreased by 5.6% (or by 54 units): the number of state and municipal educational institutions of higher education decreased by 3.3% (by 18 units) ; the number of operating private educational institutions of higher education - by

9% (for 36 units). There was also a further decrease in the number of students in educational institutions of higher education. Thus, compared to 2015, the number of students decreased by 442.5 thousand people, and a significant decrease in the number occurred in private educational organizations (by 12.25% of the number of students in 2015). The unification of professional educational organizations, training skilled workers, office workers with professional organizations, training mid-level specialists continued. In 2016, the number of professional educational organizations that carry out educational activities under secondary vocational education programs decreased by 3.1% (or 112 units) and amounted to 3526 organizations.

Depending on the level of standardization, markets for homogeneous educational services should be distinguished (these include educational institutions that train specialists in a particular field of activity); markets for differentiated educational services, where training services for various specialties are concentrated in one educational institution.

By the terms of the provision of educational services, it is customary to distinguish the market of long-term educational programs - obtaining additional and higher professional education (from 6 months to 6 years); market of medium-term educational programs (from 1 to 6 months); market of short-term educational programs provided by faculties and institutes for advanced training (various seminars, courses for a period of 1 day to 1 month).

There is also a segmentation of the educational services market depending on its capacity. Allocate a potential market (a set of consumers who are interested in the market offer of an educational institution); accessible market (a set of consumers who are not only interested in a specific offer, but also have the opportunity to purchase an educational service); the serviced market (the part of the available market where the educational institution makes efforts to attract and serve customers); actual market (a set of consumers who have already purchased a specific educational service).

table 2 - Population by age groups 2011-2016, thousand people

Age, years:	2011 r.	2012 r.	2013	2014	2015	Feb 2016
rate of increase in% to the previous year
growth rate in% to the previous year
growth rate in% to the previous year
growth rate in% to the previous year

Source:

Table 3 - Educational organizations of higher education at the beginning of the academic year 2011-2016

Academic year	educational organizations	growth,	students - total, thousand people	growth,
State and municipal educational institutions of higher education
Private educational institutions of higher education

Source: compiled according to Rosstat data: http://www.gks.ru

The segmentation of the educational services market on a territorial basis is of great importance. Thus, it is possible to single out the urban, regional (oblast), regional, national and international sectors of educational markets, each of which has a clear spatial limitation. Conditionally, the primary element of this system is the urban educational market, which means the sphere of exchange of services, limited by the territorial boundaries of the city. The national market is limited by state borders. The international market covers foreign consumers of educational services. The services provided in this market include international educational programs for the exchange of students and teachers, for joint training, etc. The international market has been developing very dynamically over the past decade. Thus, the number of foreign students in Russia has been steadily growing since the beginning of 2013. In 2015-2016 academic year As of the beginning of the year, 242.5 thousand people were trained in the Russian Federation. within the framework of academic exchanges with foreign universities.

Table 4 - The number of foreign students studying in educational institutions of higher education in the Russian Federation

The largest group of those receiving education in the domestic higher school were people from the former Soviet republics, their number in 2015-2016 academic year. was 188.1 thousand people, which is 77.6% of the total number of foreign citizens (see Fig. 1). The largest contingent of foreign citizens using the educational services of Russian universities on a full-time basis was citizens of Kazakhstan in the 2015-2016 academic year. The second place was taken by Uzbekistan, followed by Turkmenistan, Ukraine and China.

Figure: 1

You can also divide the markets of educational services into sectors depending on the federal districts (Central, North-West, South, North-Caucasian, Volga, Ural, Siberian, Far East and Crimean).

We see that in the districts, as well as in the country as a whole, there is a decrease in the number of students in higher education programs, which once again proves that there is an increase in competition between educational institutions for a potential consumer. The district with the largest student population is the Central Federal District. As of the beginning of 2015, 1,455.3 thousand people were trained in higher education programs, however, for the entire period under review, 2013-2015. every year there is a steady decrease in the number (see Table 5). This decrease is due to the fact that since the beginning of 2010 there has been a yearly decrease in the population in the age group of potential students in the country as a whole. The most unfavorable situation in 2015 was in the North Caucasian and Far Eastern districts, where a decrease in the number of 38 thousand people and 25.1 thousand people was recorded, respectively (in percentage terms by 12.89% and 12.27%).

Table 5 - The number of students of educational institutions of higher education by constituent entities of the Russian Federation

Academic year The subject of the Russian Federation	2013/ 2014,	2014/ 2015,		2015/ 2016,	Growth rate, in% to the previous year
Central Federal District
Northwestern Federal District
North Caucasian Federal District
Volga Federal District
Ural Federal District
Siberian Federal District
Far Eastern Federal District
Crimean Federal District
Total Russian Federation

The market of educational services in Russia has features that sharply distinguish it from the world. This is due not so much to the uniqueness of the services it offers, but to the fact that a relatively short time period was allocated for its formation. Only now, according to analysts, it begins to take on a more or less civilized form.

The activity of existing structures in the education system is largely subordinate to the state and depends on its administrative bodies. Thus, most educational institutions are funded from the budget, while the state provides guarantees to investors wishing to invest in the educational services market.

The state, on the other hand, determines the procedure for the distribution of preferential taxation, stimulates the training of specialists in certain specialties, methods of their training, develops compulsory programs for all educational institutions. Also, the relevant authorities have the right to refuse to grant licenses, carry out certification and monitoring of universities, etc.

The interaction of all participants (pupils and students, organizations that provide training or finance the process, etc.) began to form in the nineties, with the introduction of new economic realities. It was then that non-state institutions appeared for the first time, offering to produce the educational process on a paid basis. Today it is a rather complex system, which, according to studies of the educational services market, is divided into several components.

Firstly, the third "white" part, which includes contract departments of universities of state subordination, private universities and schools, many programs of specialized courses (accounting, language learning, driving, programming, etc.). Secondly, this is the "gray" sector, which includes institutions of all forms of ownership and private entrepreneurs who allow distortion of the document flow about their activities. The most common form of payment here is “voluntary donations”. And finally, the "black" sector. There are no formalized licenses here, or the activity is carried out outside the prescribed framework. There are bribery systems at all stages - from admission to passing exams and tests.

The labor market and the market for educational services are extremely heterogeneous, regional institutions lag behind both in the quality of training and in the level of payment for it. According to statistics, Moscow universities cost a student on average 40% more than all-Russian universities. However, the prestige of the institution often comes out on top, which Muscovites did not fail to take advantage of.

Opening of branches in the regions has become very popular today. A prestigious university rents premises, hires local teachers, provides them with a program and teaching aids - and improves the learning process. Often, such programs are rather monotonous and limited; recruitment is made only for the most popular specialties in the country (accountants, lawyers, managers, economists).

Despite the significant "overproduction", economic universities continue to lead in the educational services market. About 40% of applicants seek to get an economic education, which is explained by their interest in business and entrepreneurship. Related specialties (auditors, analysts) are also quite in demand.

At the second level are technical specialties, primarily in the IT field. Their relevance and great opportunities for development and growth do not require proof. PR specialists, marketers, sales managers and brand managers are also in demand. And rapidly growing retail chains are looking for qualified merchandisers and sales representatives.

Also, universities promptly responded to the development of the service sector. This sector of the economy is experiencing a shortage of narrow specialists: administrators of restaurants and hotels, medical workers for private clinics. Against this background, the need for lawyers, who a few years ago were leading in the research of the educational services market, has noticeably decreased.

Today, experts note great prospects for engineers and technologists of science-intensive industries, translators. The main problem is the inability to quickly meet the changing needs for specialists, since their training takes years.