Schoolchildren, it seems, have already passed the exam and are about to go to apply to universities. Programming and IT-technologies are in stable demand, approximately like legal and economic specialties 10 years ago.
In this article I will tell you how higher education for IT works, how to choose the right IT specialty.
The article will be useful not only for applicants-2015, but also for high school students who have already decided to connect their lives with IT.
Do I need to go to college to become a programmer?
There are many points of view on this issue and, I am sure, it will be raised more than once in the comments. In my humble opinion, higher education is not a prerequisite for becoming an IT specialist, just like a guarantee of this. But it can become a solid foundation for professional growth.You can read books, participate in the OpenSource community, work part-time on oDesk and in a few years you will be an experienced developer without a higher education. True, nothing prevents you from doing all this in parallel with your studies at the university, except for your own laziness.
You can enter, take tests and exams, get a diploma and not end up becoming a professional programmer - there are millions of such stories.
A good university provides, first of all, excellent conditions for gaining knowledge, experience, connections and growing as a person. And it depends only on you how you will use them (and whether you will at all).
Let's assume conditionally that you have already decided to get a higher education in the field of IT, and let's move on.
Bachelor, specialist and master
Since the Ministry of Education decided to integrate Russia into the Bologna system of higher education, years have passed and much has changed. Previously, all IT specialists could only receive a specialist diploma. The last graduates graduated this year (with the exception of specialties where the training period is more than 5 years).
Now you can become a bachelor, after that - a master, and then go to graduate school to compete for the Russian analogue of Ph.D.
What has really changed?
In the old curricula for "specialists" the number of hours was cut by one year, while the most difficult disciplines were either removed or reduced. Many academic topics from the field of algebra, probability theory, physics will remain uncovered by the teacher for the bachelor. In a number of specialties where programming is an auxiliary competence (for example, information security), various programming technologies have come under the knife - from web development to parallel programming.
Otherwise, neither the theoretical material nor the teaching methods have changed. The amount of material has been reduced. If in some university they used to give laboratory for Pascal, then they still give them.
At the same time, master's curricula can boast of novelty. This can be written separately if there is a demand.
It should be borne in mind that a bachelor is not a ready-made employee who can come to an employer with a red diploma and ask for an average salary in a hospital. A bachelor knows something, knows something from technology, but as a rule he does not know how to work in a team, a large team and completely independently solve specific practical problems. In the terminology of developers, this is a Junior, promising to become a Middle Developer in 2-4 years. In many companies, such graduates with no experience arrange internship programs with a mentor for 6-12 months.
Applied and Academic Baccalaureate
Of course, the fact that the specialty was simply reduced by 20% could not please the Ministry of Education. Few people can please the "underspecialist", who now knows even less. Therefore, from 2015 applied baccalaureate will be introduced everywhere as an alternative to incomplete academic education.In short, the applied one differs from the academic one in a new curriculum, where all disciplines are focused on producing an employee who is as ready as possible for real work tasks. Without internships and other headaches for the employer. For example, a “mathematician-programmer” can come out of an academic bachelor’s degree, and “.Net developer”, “Relational database developer” or “C ++ programmer” from an applied one. The latter are more interesting to the labor market immediately after graduating from a university, the first ones after graduating from a bachelor's degree should enter the master's program and further develop their competencies in order to qualify for higher positions after graduation. Another useful thing is the participation of employers (as practice bases) and IT vendors in the applied bachelor's curriculum.
Despite the fact that the idea, in my opinion, is sound and its implementation was started 5 years ago in 44 pilot universities, I have not yet met either qualitatively new teaching materials or graduates ready for independent work. I assume that nothing will change in the next 2-3 years and there will be no significant difference in the preparation of academic and applied bachelor's programs. Nevertheless, if you have already decided to be a master - go to the academic one, if after 4 years of study you plan to go to work, and return to the master's program "someday" - then apply.
Teaching at the university
If they study at school, then they study at the university. And the difference is huge. Nobody will force you to study. If you want to get a diploma - sit, understand, ask classmates. A teacher is just a carrier of knowledge who knows how to explain this knowledge. His goal is to tell, yours is to understand. If you didn’t understand something, the teacher fulfilled his goal anyway. Even if in some cases this is not the case, it is better to think in such a paradigm, there will be less disappointment.
The quality of teaching lies precisely in how well the teacher conveys knowledge to you, what practical competence you gain. For example, you can convey the OOP principle in the Delphi programming language, or you can use C# or Java. You will understand OOP anyway if you try, but familiarity with C# or Java will be useful for you in the future, when preparing term papers, for a part-time job or further employment.
Teaching is an inert thing. The more the teacher reads the same course using the same technologies as an example, the better he is able to convey knowledge to students. But IT technologies are changing too fast, so two extremes are possible:
- the teacher reads you something that is morally outdated, but you understand everything perfectly
- the teacher talks about the latest technologies, but you still have big gaps in understanding something (if you don’t fill them yourself in books, on StackOverflow or MSDN, then it will remain so).
In addition to splitting the bachelor's degree into academic and applied, education standards are also being updated from the second generation to 3 and 3+. With so many changes in teaching, there is a risk that the next 2-3 intakes of students will be worse prepared than the next. And that means more personal effort.
When choosing a university and specialty, it is desirable to know Who and What will tell you. Before making the final choice, ask current students, read student groups on VK.
Choice of specialty
So, you have decided to get higher education, to become a programmer. And not just a programmer, but, for example, a web developer specializing in frontend. It's cool that at the age of 18 you already have a goal in life, but I hasten to upset. In our country, there is such a thing as higher education standards, and they are much more abstract than you would like.A complete list of higher education standards can be viewed here. Not everyone still has generation 3+ standards, but they will by the end of the year. I recommend reading these boring documents.
Mathematical support and administration of information systems (MOAIS).
A specialty that provides the best conditions for the development of developer competencies.You will study: programming technologies in various languages (usually in 4 years you will get acquainted with at least three programming languages - for example: C ++, C #, Lisp, or C ++, Java, Python), development and basic administration of relational and object-oriented databases, network technologies , development of applications "client-server", "client - application server - database server", parallel programming.
Training gives an understanding of programming in principle, in a couple of months you are able to learn any programming language and develop in it; understanding how any program works, how to solve most computational problems. After receiving a diploma, you are a strong Junior, but as soon as you deal with specific tasks and tools in a particular company, the knowledge base will be enough to qualify for Middle.
After work experience and a good master's degree in this specialty, you will not only be able to create programs and information systems, but will get acquainted with the principles of developing high-load systems, managing a team, planning development, and will be able to apply for Senior and Team Lead.
Fundamental informatics and information technologies (FIIT).
The specialty is close to MOAIS, but focused on computational experiments and research tasks.In other words, as a programmer you will be in top shape, but you will be almost useless for solving practical business problems. But you are a valuable asset to R&D departments, science labs and research teams. Studying in this specialty at a good university makes it possible to choose a place of work around the world, working in well-known companies. It is already initially assumed that a bachelor's degree will be only the first step in your education.
A very real story: having received a bachelor's degree at Moscow State University, enter the CalTech master's program. Of course, physics, algebra and mathematical analysis should be your passion.
Informatics and Computer Engineering (IWT)
The specialty is focused on the education of system programmers working with hardware. You will have the skills to program robots, real-time systems and work with a blowtorch. With such an education, you don’t want to develop boring accounting systems and web applications, but your further career can start as a video surveillance engineer in a small private security company, or in a robotics laboratory of a large brand (of course, after completing a master’s program).In my opinion, everything is with purely programmer specialties. Below is a list of specialties where programming is also taught. But if the specialties above have a curriculum designed so that a Programmer graduates, then the specialties below have a Specialist in something with programming skills.
Not only a programmer
Software engineering
A relatively new specialty, essentially training software product managers. This specialist looks over development tasks, manages requirements, functionality, versions, development teams. In the first courses, you will learn programming technologies and, perhaps, a couple of languages, but later in the curriculum there will be more and more about software development management. You can start your career as a Junior Developer, but instead of further upgrading to Middle, you will become a project manager.Applied Informatics
It produces system analysts with a broad outlook in IT and business. They also know how to code, but they are really good at writing technical specifications, formalizing business processes and communicating effectively with developers who hover in high abstractions. You can become a project manager or even a director of your company if you have such ambitions.Business Informatics
It is very close to applied informatics, but the graduate's managerial competencies are much stronger. You can be an IT application consultant or manage the IT policy of a small holding. After receiving a diploma, start working at least in support, but the career goal of "IT Director" can be achieved in a matter of years.Information systems and technologies
Focus on the administration of information technology and the right choice of software and hardware for the tasks of a corporate local area network. Programming will be, but at a procedural level, closer to scripts and configuration files.Mathematics and Computer Science
A large portion of fundamental knowledge will allow you to work both as a computer science teacher at school and as an analyst in a large company. In a good university, this specialty gravitates towards scientific research and can also be a start in R&D for those who prefer mathematical sciences to physics.Information Security
The first course is often similar to specialties like MOAIS, where they program a lot and in different languages, but then it stops. You don't have to write code, you have to understand how any code can be attacked. Networks and operating systems will be familiar to anyone else, you can call yourself a hacker, but you will have to work in the field of security, with regulatory documents, and not just with firewalls and sniffer.It is important to understand that everything depends on the particular educational institution. It's like the HTML standard and its implementation on the site of a provincial beauty salon. There are universities where students of all specialties go to the same lectures. There are universities where MOAIS studies Visual Basic and Pascal, writes macros in Excel, and studies databases using the example of Access. If there is such a university in your hometown, then it's time to buy train tickets.
The choice of a specialty upon admission is extremely important, since it determines a further career and, perhaps, a lifetime. This is essentially the first independent choice in life and the error will be measured in years. Therefore, it’s too early to “breathe” after the exam, it’s time to learn as much as possible about the nearest university, its students and teachers. Good luck.
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At our university, education is carried out according to educational programs. This means that any applicant first chooses an interesting program for himself, then tries to enroll in it, and then, if he becomes a student, he will study on this program.
The programs offered by the university are very different - from secondary education programs to postgraduate and doctoral programs. If we talk only about higher education, then at the Higher School of Economics you can get higher education at various levels in the main educational programs of bachelor's, specialist's, master's, as well as programs for the training of scientific and pedagogical personnel in graduate school. In addition to the levels of education, programs may differ in areas of training. Currently, our university provides training in a wide range of educational areas – not only in the socio-economic “titular” for HSE, but also in the humanities, engineering and computer sciences. So, in 2017, about 30 different areas of training are offered for training.
Faculties and educational programs
The two main entities that a student encounters during his studies at the university are his faculty and the educational program. HSE has , which describes the activities of the faculty and formulates its main task as "ensuring a high level of training for students, graduate students, students, ongoing scientific research and design work ...". As a rule, educational programs are “assigned” to certain faculties, and faculties (depending on their size) can have a different number of educational programs, from a few to several dozen. The rules by which each educational program lives and develops are fixed in
What does a student remember when it comes to his educational program?
Of course, about his fellow students and teachers with whom he meets at lectures, seminars, master classes, about what he is taught and where he can work after studying ... Undoubtedly, these are integral parts of any program, but its main "official" characteristic - This is the curriculum that the student will have to fully master during the period of study. is closely related to the current educational standard for this area of training and level of education. The Higher School of Economics, as a national research university, received the right to independently set educational standards (see Article 11 of the Federal Law "On Education in the Russian Federation"), and it used this right. So the university appeared .
Briefly about the curriculum of the educational program
Based on its OS, each major educational program at the Higher School of Economics develops a curriculum. In the curriculum of the program, there are always both compulsory disciplines and electives: within the framework of this program, there are also disciplines from the university-wide pools of disciplines with which students can supplement their individual learning path (, in the master's program,).
Students who have successfully completed their studies, as well as passed the final certification, receive a “document on education and qualifications” of the appropriate level and direction of training, in other words, a diploma.
Who manages the educational program?
All administrative issues in the implementation of the program are resolved by the study office, and its activities are regulated. Students can contact the staff of the study office with all organizational issues that arise during the training.
Where can I get information about the program
You can get detailed information about any educational program of higher education at the National Research University Higher School of Economics on its website. Actually, the program website is a detailed image of the program, and it is designed for various categories of users: applicants and their parents, students, representatives of external structures that regulate educational activities. The site has mandatory sections, of which:
- applicants can learn all the most important things about entering the program, for example,
- students find information on the educational process and student life in general (: bulletin board, schedule, ratings, etc., including);
- all categories of users can familiarize and read these courses, see the "quality marks" received by the program (its various accreditations and certifications), and a lot of other useful information;
- and, of course, the program's website contains the contacts of its academic supervisor and study office, where you can always ask questions about the program and, importantly, get answers.
Hello reader! You probably already understood that studying at the university is a very important stage in life, which most accurately reflects the future fate of a person. Higher education helps not only to find a job worthy of one's qualifications, but also to gain respect from colleagues and superiors, as well as to rapidly move along the so-called "trade union line" and secure a comfortable existence. However, for now, all these are dreams, and the student, as you know, "lives from session to session."
It is just about this period “from session to session” that it is worth talking in more detail, since in the charter of any university it is called the “curriculum”. If you strictly follow all her recommendations, then problems with academic performance certainly should not arise.
Before talking about the features of the educational process, it is worth noting that curriculum called an action plan approved by the Ministry of Science and Education of the Russian Federation, which allows you to determine the amount of knowledge and skills suitable for a particular course of study at the university.
In simpler terms, it is clearly defined which segment of the program the student must complete in the first, second, third, fourth and fifth years. In accordance with the curriculum, teachers create academic plan, that is, they provide in writing information about what students will do in each course in pairs, what knowledge and skills they will receive, what new sciences they will get acquainted with and how deeply.
So, if we talk in a simple way, then the curriculum at the university is the boss, and the curriculum is his subordinate. That is why this type of reporting concerns not so much students as teachers, who, within the established time frame, must provide the expected amount of both theoretical and practical information proposed for study by university students.
In those cases when the teacher understands that he does not have time to “subtract his hours”, he organizes voluntarily - forced couples at an inopportune time in order to quickly catch up with the material that was not completed on time.
Perhaps such scrupulousness is not important for the student, but the task of the teacher is to provide for study those topics that were approved by the curriculum at the beginning of the academic year. In general, this is very important, and this most important issue should not be ignored.
Principles for creating a curriculum
As I said, the curriculum at the university is approved by the Minister of Science and Education of the Russian Federation, and the curriculum is approved by the dean or head of the department. It immediately becomes interesting, but on what principles is the selection of the program, which many teachers of higher educational institutions honor, like the charter and the second Constitution?
There are several evaluation criteria here, and let's discuss them in more detail:
1. Relevance of the selected topics and subjects. Scientific and technological progress, however, as well as the achievements of science and culture, do not stand still; Therefore, those topics in the curriculum that were relevant a few years ago have now become “morally obsolete”, that is, unclaimed.
To understand what is at stake, let me remind you of the immortal Lenin and the brilliant Karl Marx with his Capital. In the first case, our mothers and fathers knew by heart the biography of this "people's favorite", and all the congresses of the CPSU in detail and completely bounced off their teeth (even if you wake me up at night and ask).
As for “Capital” by Karl Marx, I personally did not go through this topic at school and university; and the life of Vladimir Ilyich in my history textbook was devoted to only a couple of pages. Now, I think, it is clear what "obsolete information" means.
2. Social education of students. Studying should be not only cognitive and compulsory, but also have a social connotation, that is, the material is selected so that the student learns something useful and vital from the information received, and does not leave the content of the subject "behind the scenes", so to speak.
3. Development of creative abilities. Very often the teacher says about some of his students: "He does not see beyond his own nose." In this case, we are not talking about poor eyesight at all, but about narrowness of outlook, lack of imagination and primitive thinking.
If a student does not know how to sort and apply the information received on a pair, then it is unlikely that he will become a competent and qualified specialist in the future. However, it is quite possible to learn this in five years, the main thing is to set a goal and take a responsible approach to the educational process.
4. Sequence of presentation of knowledge. The curriculum is structured in such a way that the curriculum begins with simple and accessible information, but gradually becomes more complex and deep. Simply put, without knowing the multiplication table, you can’t solve examples to find the discriminant, for example. I think the main idea in this case is clear.
5. Communication of the studied subjects. The curriculum includes those subjects that are interconnected or logically complement each other. For example, it can be ecology, chemistry, biology; or psychology, sociology and natural science. In general, it turns out that a Russian student receives a comprehensive education, which cannot be said about foreign teaching methods, but more on that later.
Now it is clear what the school curriculum is, and what points are important in its annual compilation or correction. As a rule, the curriculum at the university has not changed dramatically for many years, but every year it is supplemented with new facts and topics that, as you know, are relevant at the moment and keep pace with the times.
Features of the national curriculum
This means that in September, after the holidays, they begin to spontaneously attend a number of lectures within the framework of their specialty, and after that they independently select for themselves those subjects that, in their opinion, are the most necessary.
No, of course, there is basic knowledge that you want or don’t want, but you will have to get it, however, already in the second year, a student of an overseas university studies those topics that they consider the most necessary in their future profession.
And they can also attend painting pairs, literary and artistic circles, but only for their own pleasure, or to consider themselves a comprehensively developed person. Such seminars are additional classes, but students are ready to go to the university solely for the sake of attending them.
Now it is clear why domestic specialists are so in demand abroad. The fact is that these are generalists who, while studying complex mechanisms, write essays in parallel in business Russian, or conduct experiments in chemistry (in the first year).
Where an imported specialist will expect the help of another narrow specialist, the domestic one will sort it out himself; remember at least an episode from the immortal picture "Moscow does not believe in tears", during the conversation between Katya and the head of the shop about the breakdown of the machine.
How to build a curriculum?
I found information on the net that the curriculum can be built in two ways - concentric and linear. Although this information is more necessary for teachers, I still decided to figure out what these intricate terms mean. And here's what I dug up:
concentric way- This is a systematic repetition of the material covered, but each time in a more in-depth form. As a rule, this technique is used in modern higher educational institutions, colleges and vocational schools. As the practice of many years shows, the method really works in practice, and has already allowed to release more than one excellent student (qualified specialist).
Linear way associates the curriculum with "links in the same chain". The task of the teacher is to consistently pay attention to each link, and proceed to the next only after an in-depth study of the previous one.
In this case, the main emphasis is on the logic that connects all the links of one chain. This method of curriculum creation works best in schools, but can also be used in other schools.
In conclusion, we can only add that it is not the students who set the curriculum, it is not for them to cancel it or ignore it. If you come to study at a university, please follow all the rules that exist within its walls, which have been working here for a long time and honed to automatism. And amateur performance, arrogance and systematic violation of the rules are definitely not welcome here!
Conclusion: In the article I presented, I told in detail to all interested students and not only what the curriculum at the university is, who invented it, and how it is correctly compiled in practice.
The topic is important, the topic is necessary, especially when there are still five long years of hard study ahead! On the pages of the site, the site succinctly presents all the information on a given topic, so henceforth no one should have any more questions.
Now you know what is a university curriculum and how important it is for successful learning.
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Recommendations for admission to foreign educational organizations
You need to start preparing for admission to a foreign university in advance - preferably a year in advance. This is due to the difficulties in preparing a package of documents, the deadlines for submitting documents to foreign universities, the need to pass language and professional exams at certified testing centers, which set both the dates of the exams themselves and the deadlines for pre-registration for these exams. There are such centers in almost all major cities of the Russian Federation.
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An approximate list of educational programs implemented in foreign universities in the areas approved under the Global Education Program.
IMPORTANT! This list of educational programs is not complete, it can be updated and supplemented. We ask you to check the availability and details of programs on the websites of universities.
Presentations and webinars on admission to foreign universities
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