Prague University of Economics and Business
Faculty of Informatics and Statistics
IMPACT OF CORONAVIRUS ON THE ROLE OF DIGITAL COMMUNICATION PLATFORMS IN
HIGHER EDUCATION IN RUSSIA
MASTER THESIS
Study programme: Faculty of Informatics and Statistics Field of study: Information System Management
Author: Anton Astaev
Supervisor: Ing. PhDr. Antonín Pavlíček, Ph.D.
Prague, May 2021
Declaration
I hereby declare that I am the sole author of the thesis entitled “Impact of coronavirus on the role of digital communication platforms in higher education in Russia”. I duly marked out all quotations. The used literature and sources are stated in the attached list of
references.
Prague 3rd of May 2021 Astaev Anton
Acknowledgement
I hereby wish to express my appreciation and gratitude to the supervisor of my thesis, Ing.
PhDr. Antonín Pavlíček, Ph.D.
Abstract
This thesis considers the attitude of students at Russian universities who have faced distance learning with help of digital communication platforms due to coronavirus’s quarantine. The goal is to provoke the students to analyze the value of digital technologies, digital communication platforms, as a mechanism for teaching and to see if there are any potentials for digital communication platforms’ development after the coronavirus in the Russian Federation and is there any possibility to further universities transition to digital education permanently. What is more, the paper disclosures the topic with help of comparative analysis examines two time periods before quarantine from March till May 2020 and after it. The research is based on secondary and primary information where primary data gained through the survey with Russian students leads to the idea that further digitalization of higher education in the country seems to be possible.
Keywords
Digital Communication Platforms, Social Networks, the Internet, Russia, Universities, Education, Coronavirus, Quarantine, Students, Distance Learning, Online.
Content
Introduction ... 9
1 Theoretical part ... 13
1.1 Digital Communication Platforms ... 13
1.1.1 Forms of social networks and of social media ... 15
1.2 Coronavirus’s quarantine in Russia ... 17
1.2.1 Situation before quarantine ... 17
1.2.1.1 Internet penetration in Russia ... 17
1.2.1.2 The use of digital communication platforms by universities ...19
1.2.2 Situation after quarantine ... 20
1.2.2.1 University infrastructure and teacher’s awareness in social networks ... 21
1.2.2.2 The use of digital communication platforms by universities ... 22
1.2.2.3 Adaptation to a new format of education ... 23
1.3 How digital communication platforms influence the choice of university applicants ... 25
1.4 Online learning as an educational technology ... 27
1.5 Common issues in the transition of education to digital communication platforms . 31 1.6 Transition back to offline education ... 33
2 Methodology ... 35
3 Analysis ... 37
3.1 Analysis of secondary surveys and statistical data ... 37
3.1.1 Analysis of Tomsk State University’s survey ... 37
3.1.2 Analysis of Tuvan State University’s survey ...41
3.1.3 Analysis of National Institute of Business’s survey ... 46
3.1.4 Analysis of the Report of High School of Economics’ report ... 48
3.2 Analysis of primary survey... 50
3.3 Comparison of secondary and primary surveys ...61
Conclusion ... 65
List of references ... 68 Appendixes ... I Appendix A: Survey for students of Russian universities ... I Appendix B: Regression analysis spreadsheet... IV
List of Figures
Figure 1. Share of population using the internet in Russia in December 2019, by age group (Statista, 2020) ... 18 Figure 2. Male and female population in Russia by age (Jan,1.2020) (Statista, 2020) ...19 Figure 3. Usage of digital communication platforms in distance learning in Russia during coronavirus quarantine (Aleshkovsky, 2020) ... 23 Figure 4. Hofstede cultural model in Russia (Mcdonald, 2017) ... 31 Figure 5. Application of digital communication platforms in education at TSU (IDO TSU, 2016) ... 38 Figure 6. Difficulties of students in application of electronic courses/digital communication platforms in education (IDO TSU, 2016) ... 39 Figure 7. Time which was spend by students in digital communication platforms for education (IDO TSU, 2016) ... 39 Figure 8. Attitude of students to usage of digital communication platforms in education (IDO TSU, 2016) ... 40 Figure 9. How students evaluate future possibly to replace offline lectures on online lecture through LMS Moodle (IDO TSU, 2016) ... 40 Figure 10. Are you satisfied with the distance learning process? (TSU, 2020) ...41 Figure 11. Was it convenient for you to study remotely? (TSU, 2020) ... 42 Figure 12. The level of motivation of students for learning in the distance form was… (TSU, 2020) ... 42 Figure 13. What remote tools were used in the process of your studying? (TSU, 2020) .... 43 Figure 14. How do you assess the work of the teaching staff in the framework of distance learning? (TSU, 2020) ... 44 Figure 15. Issues with which students faced during application of digital communication platforms (TSU, 2020) ... 44 Figure 16. Advantages of digital communication platforms application in educational process (TSU, 2020) ... 45 Figure 17. How often do you use information from digital communication platforms and from university’s webpage? (NIB, 2020)... 46 Figure 18. How do you feel about distance learning with help of social networks? (NIB, 2020) ... 47 Figure 19. Are you satisfied with the way distance learning organize? (NIB, 2020) ... 47 Figure 20. Evaluation of Russian universities’ readiness (HSU NRU, 2020) ... 48 Figure 21. Issues with which Russian students faced during online education (HSU NRU, 2020) ... 49 Figure 22. The most usable digital communication platforms for e-learning in Russia (HSU NRU, 2020) ... 50 Figure 23. Did you use digital communication platforms for your education at university before Coronavirus quarantine? (Author, 2021) ... 51 Figure 24. Do you use digital communication platforms for your education at university after Coronavirus quarantine? (Author, 2021) ... 52 Figure 25. Were digital communication platforms changed during the transition period from offline to online learning and vice versa? (Author, 2021) ... 52 Figure 26. Where is your university located? (Author, 2021) ... 53
Figure 27. Which method of distance learning have you used at university during Coronavirus quarantine? (Author, 2021) ... 54 Figure 28. How do you feel about online learning with help of digital communication platforms? (Author, 2021) ... 55 Figure 29. Are you satisfied with usage of digital communication platforms during the distance learning process? (Author, 2021) ... 55 Figure 30. Was it comfortable for you to study online with help of digital communication platforms? (Author, 2021) ... 56 Figure 31. How did you adapt for online learning through digital communication platforms?
(Author, 2021) ... 56 Figure 32. The level of my motivation to study online through digital communication platforms was… (Author, 2021) ... 57 Figure 33. How do you evaluate readiness of your university for online learning? (Author, 2021) ... 57 Figure 34. How fast did your professors pull off with digital communication platforms during the quarantine? (Author, 2021) ... 58 Figure 35. Which applications of digital communication platforms are you using today at university? (Author, 2021)... 58 Figure 36. How much time per one week do you spend in digital communication platforms which are required for your education? (Author, 2021) ... 59 Figure 37. What did you like during your online education through digital communication platforms? (Author, 2021) ... 59 Figure 38. What problems did you have with digital communication platforms during online learning? (Author, 2021) ... 60 Figure 39. How do you think is it possible to fully replace offline education on online learning through digital communication platforms in earliest future? (Author, 2021)...61
List of abbreviations
BMSTU Bauman Moscow State Technical University ETU “LETI” Saint Petersburg Electrotechnical University FEFU Far Eastern Federal University
HSE The National Research University Higher School of Economics IPhO International Physics Olympiad
LMS Learning Management System
MGIMO Moscow State Institute of International Relations MIPT Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology
MSHERF Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation
MSU Moscow State University
NSU Novosibirsk State University
OECD Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development RUDN Peoples' Friendship University of Russia
SPbU Saint Petersburg State University
TSU Tomsk State University
TSU Tuvan State University
UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
Introduction
Nowadays the importance of the Internet, social media, social networks, and digital communication platforms are inseparably connected with the life of all people around the world, and it does not matter from which sphere of business is a person. Human beings are all dependent on social networks; people are working, teaching, learning, communicating, and doing many other things with help of the social media channels. Essentially, the situation was different even twenty years ago when people preferred live communication to online actives. The key reason for such changes is the wish of people to get more information and do it for less time used than it was before. However, there happened another factor for such rapid progress in using digital communication platforms and was the appearance of coronavirus. That forced most people to change their lifestyle and to move from offline to online life. In fact, the main objective of the thesis is to understand: How did coronavirus influence on the usage of digital communication platforms by universities in the way of educating students? It is significant to make an analysis as these changes are a new stage in the history of the education process which theoretically should fundamentally move the process on a new level.
Undoubtedly, there are some advantages and disadvantages in the application of digital communication platforms in the university formation in the Russian Federation and the whole world at all. From the one side, education through digital communication platforms can be much faster and easier, it can be more affordable and suitable for some group of people. For example, disabled people will not spend time to overcome the distance from their houses to universities what sometimes can be onerously for them; or students who do not have enough money to go to other countries and live there for some years, but they still want to get European or American education, and they can do it online and from home. On the other side, offline education can be more interactive, it also can help to develop communication skills among students in real-life and to connect more different people together. Both sides have their positive and negative signs and that will be also researched in the paperwork. Nevertheless, social networks and social media are aimed to help people in the communication and coworking process without physical contacts which are extremally needed today during coronavirus times.
Importantly, features of social media are attracting participants to the education process as the use of the internet has almost zero cost and of course it cuts the geographical borders.
The last point is extremely significant for people of science due to the reason that they have access to the various information, knowledge of other people, and scientific research. What is the most substantial part is that this is no time limits, and the information flow is running all the time. In addition, the main benefit is that people can use different social media and networks just using mobiles, tabs, laptops, computers, and sometimes even smartwatches.
Particularly, digital communication platforms are able to make the interaction much easier not only for students, professors but also for many other job representatives including businessmen, sportsmen, marketers, or different instructors. Given these points there can be seen that there is a mass of factors which are on a side of the application of the Internet
not only in daily life but also in education at universities in the Russian Federation what can positively influence the training of future specialists. Nonetheless, there are points which are against of hundred percent usage of the digital communication platforms for educating people, especially it can be harmful to the cultivation of future doctors, builders, electricians, mechanical engineers, and many others. As well as these professions require some sort of practical activities at universities under the supervision of professors in order to be fully familiarized with their main work tasks at real workplaces.
Another key point is that digital communication platforms are an inherent part of the paperwork that should be deeply analyzed in higher education from the different periods which is dived on two historical moments: before and after the coronavirus quarantine in March – May 2020. In this case, the whole analysis and theory are related to one country analysis and the comparison of two time periods before and after the coronavirus infection at the universities in Russia.
Under those circumstances, the role of international organizations the same as the influence of the Russian government should be also clarified. “The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the World Bank are leading the way in monitoring the impact of the spread of COVID-19 on the education system.” (AC of the RF, 2020) Those organizations have common analysis for various countries what includes the Russian Federation, too. It was based on all participants of the education process: teachers, students, management team, and others. It is required in order to see a total comparison among others and to force some international organizations to give practical recommendations to the certain country what should be improved for further development in a state. All things considered, these well-known organizations are emphasizing the role of progress in education and are helping those parties which need their support in financial and in providing a piece of advice for them.
Similarly, the role of international organizations, the thesis is taking into account the impact of the government in the evolution of educational operations from the typical offline version when professors and students are physically coming to universities to the form when both parties only need to use their electronic devices for connecting to the study platforms. Those platforms are digital communication platforms which are the main topic in the thesis. They are existing in various types and every university can choose the most suitable social networking for the work depending on different features and sometimes on price. This will be studied in more detail in the theoretical part.
In like manner, the paperwork examines the side of professors and students of the universities and their readiness to start the educational process in a new style. What is more, that should be done comparatively fast. It is significant to take into consideration their reviews about the situation and especially to find out their attitude to the usage of digital communication platforms in daily life. Indeed, the experience of Russian education participants needs to be compared with the international practice of their colleagues such as some eastern countries and European states.
As it was already said before, the thesis is focusing on the research of usage of digital communication platforms at higher education in the Russian Federation comparing two
timelines before and after the coronavirus quarantine between March and May 2020. The target idea is to determine how was the attitude and usage of digital communication platforms changing in the way of education at Russian universities before and after the coronavirus quarantine. What kind of experience do students and professors have with digital communication platforms as a tool for teaching? What are the benefits and issues of a digital communication platforms’ application in studying and how can it be improved for future years? The problem needs to be considered from different angles such as management teams of the universities, students, international organizations, government, social media developers who are responsible for supporting and developing their tools, and many others. However, the most reliable sources are professors and students who spend a lot of time daily on the platforms and they have their point of view on the suitability of the applications in a study process to get better views on the topic.
In order to gain appropriate results for the research, surveys with students from Russia who are using digital communication platforms as an educational tool can be done. Important to realize that the surveys are analyzed only from the students’ side and they are the dominant users of digital communications platforms. With this in mind, the primary consciousness of how students see the situation before and after coronavirus quarantine in March and May 2020, which improvement in digital communication platforms features they can suggest and how the education at universities can be protected from possible damages.
The results can be gotten just with help of answered questions such as the following: How do they think to do the digital communication platforms which they used improved or worsen the flow of knowledge? What are the most suitable social networks/media and why?
Which features in digital communication platforms are lacking? What are the most suitable functions in those digital communication platforms? Do they feel the difference in the Russian readiness to accept new ways of education through modern digital gadgets and how does it differ from the experience in other countries? The goal of the poll is to provoke Russian students to analyze the value of digital technologies, digital communication platforms, as a mechanism for teaching and to see if there are any potentials for digital communication platforms’ development after the coronavirus in the Russian Federation and if there is any possibility to further universities transition to digital education permanently.
Chapter one is clarifying theory which is applicable to the topic of the paperwork what is based on secondary research of information. The investigation for the part of the thesis is done with help of such sources as literature, scientific reports, journals, and internet sources. The main aim is to interpret to readers the field about which the thesis is. To put it in another way, the first chapter of the thesis starts from descriptions of ‘Social Networks’
and ‘Social Media’ definition, correspondingly, this was described including its different forms such as public social networks, social communities, and employee social networks, what can be applied in the research of the given topic.
In addition, the path is aimed to reveal the notions about coronavirus influence on higher education in Russia by disclosing the situation before March 2020 and after quarantine from May 2020. To be more precise, those two subchapters include such parts as internet
penetration in the country, the usage of social networks and media by universities during those two periods, universities’ infrastructure and teachers’ awareness in digital communication platforms and how the adaptation to a new way of education was going.
Other articles in the chapter focused to explain the application of digital communication platforms in the process of selecting university for getting a degree, it also describes online learning as a study tool and common issues in the transition to online education with the application of digital communication platforms and even in the transition back to offline form of education what is required for the research.
The second chapter discovers methodology which explains the methods which were applied for writing the paper. It should allow readers to grasp and clarify why these methods were used in the paper. The third chapter is focused on direct analysis what is primary information from the conducted survey and from analysis of the secondary information which was enumerated in the first chapter. To be more precise, the chapter is based on analysis on secondary and primary surveys which were done by different Russian universities at different periods of time before, during, and after coronavirus quarantine. In particular, the third chapter includes work with primary information gathered from the survey with students at different Russian universities. It is needed in order to get results from the comparative analysis of all surveys and to understand the track of communication platforms’ development and future possibilities of digitalization of universities in the country. The final part concentrates on the conclusion and some crucial points which were obtained through the third chapter, analysis.
1 Theoretical part
The part of the thesis is based on the research of secondary information which should be recognized by readers to understand the core concept of the work. At the beginning, the work clarifies the idea of digital communication platforms and their types. Then the situational analysis of two periods before and after starting of the quarantine in the first two months of spring 2020 which explains the usage of digital communication platforms by universities, universities infrastructure, internet penetration, readiness and adaptation of students, professors, and factors which influence on it will be analyzed. In the end, common issues in the transaction to the digital education will be defined.
1.1 Digital Communication Platforms
Nowadays, digital communication platforms are a key part of people’s life and the younger population is more addicted from online forms of communication. At first, there is a need to discover the whole topic of common world digitalization and the origin of digital communication platforms for that terms of social networks and social media have to be disclosed. According to Will Kenton: “Social networking is the use of Internet-based social media sites to stay connected with friends, family, colleagues, customers, or clients. Social networking can have a social purpose, a business purpose, or both, through sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram, among others.” (Kenton, 2020)
Networks are playing a tremendous role in solving human problems among which there is the functioning of companies, spiritual growth, learning, and teaching. The term is existing is not so long just for 70 years from 1954, when it was created in a theory by mathematicians.
(Mitchell, 1974) In the same decade, the first electronic mail was designed, it was ARPA Net, and it was used for military purposes. (Featherly, 2003) Nevertheless, there was created the Internet chat, IRC, in 1988; (Stenberg, 2011) later Randy Conrads presented Classmates.com in the middle of 1990s. (People Connect, 2020) Today there are a huge number of digital communication platforms which were absolutely changed for fifty years, among them are well-known digital communication platforms. To put it simply, it is a structure that is linked by one or many interconnections such as friendship, love, ideas, business, opinions, values, conflicts, trade, and, of course, education.
The digital communication platforms about which the thesis is being aimed on internal communication at universities where all members of one institution can collaborate with each other for the purpose of studying. The forms of platforms were developed some decades ago and it is improving every year especially due to conditions of coronavirus quarantine when most of the universities were transferred to the form of online education.
In addition, the digital communication platforms allow their users to have real–time contacts using different communication methods such as sending written and voice messages, graphs, pictures, screenshots, and various files and doing video and audio calls.
What is more, those platforms are required to have comfortable for people conditions in doing common deals and reaching common goals.
Under those circumstances, the most popular digital communication platforms are Facebook it has 2.7 billion users. (Statista, 2020) The statistical data is in the second quarter of 2020. According to Statista, it is the most international platform which connects almost three billion people around the globe as it is not only the platform for posting photos and videos, but also for communication with others. The next one is WhatsApp which links more than 2 billion accounts. In the third place, there is WeChat where are 1.2 billion people, however, it is very famous in China and looks like WhatsApp. (Statista, 2020) As it is written in Statista from 2020, the next places are Instagram (1,1 billion), Telegram (400 million), and many others. Important to realize, there is a difference in the Russian market, the most popular social networks are varying from those which are used in Europe, Asia, and America. For example, people prefer to interact through VKontakte and Odnoklassniki rather than through Facebook. Looking at statistics, VKontanke has more than 445 million users what is three-time higher than the amount of Russian population as well as post- Soviet countries, and people who speak Russia are using the platform, too. (OkeyGeek, 2018) However, the best way to see the real statistics and the flow of people can be calculated by statistical coverage of people who visited a social network at least once a month.
According to such calculation, the most popular were VK (which combines 66 percent of people from the total amount of population in a country), WhatsApp (63 percent), Instagram (56.2 percent), Odnoklassniki (41.8 percent) and on fifth place is Facebook with the coverage 40.7 percent from all people in a country. (Indsite, 2020) All statistics are for 2020. Given these points, YouTube is not taking into account as it is not a social network.
To be more precise, there is a need to distinguish social media and social networking from each other to be more accurate in the analysis. Social media is media which a person creates and uploads to the media platforms it can be blogs, video, podcast, and many others. It is the media that was created by a human being and was published in social media channels.
While social networks are mostly digital platforms where people are interacting and the example of such websites are Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and many others. (Jamie, 2021) The core difference is in human interaction in networks.
Despite the fact that there were shown statistics for the most well-known social networks, not of them are so frequently using for educational purposes. Consequently, there is a need to separate another group of digital platforms which will be applicable for study purposes such as Skype, Edmodo, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, and some products of Google such as Hangouts, Classroom, Docs Editors, Groups, Meet, and many others. (Jamie, 2021) Those web pages are aimed at educational purposes mostly as they allow to make video calls, create and translate presentations, write in a chat, write and upload documents. (Jamie, 2021) These features are required for teaching and learning and are suitable for teachers and students. Nevertheless, some of them have limitations on usage; for instance, Zoom allows to have a video call for more than two people longer than 40 minutes. (Zoom, 2021) If users would like to speak more than free allowed time they have to subscribe to the more expensive version of Zoom. (Zoom, 2021) The same option works for universities, but they have special offers which are not beneficial for them than just so simple users.
Another useful feature of social networks is the ability to record videos of lectures. This can also be used to record video lectures that include a presentation, video, and sound or voice of participants of any Zoom meeting. What is more, video recording can be paused and then continued what is suitable for a full understanding of lectures. The video recording is saved after it is turned off and the conference ends. It is important to note that videos made in Zoom are very lightweight and it is good to save all of them on one computer. Notably, this will allow students to easily upload such files to cloud services and include links in the online course system. In this case, such a format of education is especially beneficial for those who need to listen to the same information many times in order to remember or learn it.
1.1.1 Forms of social networks and of social media
There were found three types of social networks which are divided according to their main functions and the group of people who will potentially use them. Social networks can be spread on public social networks, social communities, and employee social networks, the difference between them consists in the purpose of use. To be more precise, social communities are managed by corporations with the goal to interact with customers, business partners, and others; another type, employee social networks, are used inside of a company, while public social networks are for the common use of all people. (see Img.1.) The last type is Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Certainly, it is significant to see the difference of the forms of social networks to understand the opportunities and threats of each of the type for doing business, especially, for universities.
Img. 1. Three Types of Social Networks. Source: (Hughes, 2013)
Each of the types has its benefits and minuses, public social networks will not be suitable for the whole study processes as they are for the big audience where only conversation, small videos, and photos sharing are possible. Definitely, it can be used just for the conversation among students, but it is uncomfortable for productive deeper discussions. Comparatively with public social networks, social communities type let people have deeper engagement with each other or between students and professors. (Hughes, 2013) This type is more suitable for business–to–business models when an organization has direct contact with
customers and when customers can communicate with each other. (Hughes, 2013) The third type, employee social networks, is appropriate for internal communication and knowledge sharing of people from one university or company. (Hughes, 2013) A bright example is Slack or Microsoft Teams where employees or students and professors can connect and learn something from this collaboration with help of sharing documents or any other materials required for that. (Hughes, 2013)
The next step is discovering social media types in order to understand the main difference between social media, networks, and digital communication platforms. There are many varied types of social media among them are discussion forums, media sharing networks, personal networks, and others which are demonstrated in image 2. The only parts of social media types which can be used for the revelation of the thesis topic are discussion forums where students can discuss their common issues, tasks, and knowledge, the next one is interest-based networks where people who have mutual concern are contacting each other and also media sharing networks when people have an opportunity to send each other their media files which can be also required for education purposes. (CoSM, 2021) In fact, the bright example of the last type is YouTube where people are uploading their video files and many students are using the platform for finding answers to their study questions. (CoSM, 2021) Nevertheless, the type is not private enough and professors usually do not do special videos for their students and do not upload them on YouTube channels.
Img. 2. Types of Social Media. Source: (CoSM, 2021)
The last two types of social networks from the first image are connected with the idea of digital communication platforms as they are both aimed at internal communication inside of a company or university. Moreover, communication networks that are applied at companies and at universities should be secured from external users as some information can be too private. (Capizmo, 2020) The main functions of the digital communication platforms are the opportunity to send emails, instant messaging, voice and video messages, to have common for internal users’ calendars with main events, to do audio and video conferences, to upload different files for common usage and some other features which
make the process of internal collaboration easier. (Capizmo, 2020) However, usually one university or company is working with not only one digital platform but have a subscription for some of them. It happens as well as people would like to get better quality for each of function. For example, students can send messages via Slack, find uploaded materials required for studying at own universities’ web platform, to have video lectures at Zoom and to send email in Microsoft Outlook.
1.2 Coronavirus’s quarantine in Russia
The infection was firstly noticed at the end of 2019 in China, later many other countries declared that citizens in their countries who recently returned from the trip in China or those who were communicated with Chinese people have symptoms similar to coronavirus infection. One by one countries set different types of limitations and like in the domino effect they started to close their borders and announced quarantine. The Russian Federation was not among the first countries which state to all public places such as shops, beauty salons, universities, schools, job places, and others to close. The president of the researched country established something like quarantine on the 30th of March 2020, the official declaration was published on a webpage of Kremlin which sounds like: “Establish non- working days from March 30 to April 3, 2020 with the preservation of wages for employees.”
(Kremlin, 2020) This statement also meant the closure of the country's borders. Later there was accepted the idea to use a special QR code in order to leave a place of living. This code could be gotten in a specially designed webpage. When a person sent a request, it took some moments to approve it. With this intention, there were applied some more rules which have been changing for the whole time of coronavirus. Importantly, the main quarantine was from the end of March until the beginning of May later there were no strict rules which could limit citizens' activities. It is significant to understand as the paperwork considers the period from May till now as a period after coronavirus quarantine and the period before the end of March as a period before the quarantine.
1.2.1 Situation before quarantine
The importance to research the situation before the pandemic quarantine of 2020 is substantial for contemplation of a full picture of the advantages, disadvantages, and possible issues in digitalization in the sphere of higher education in Russia. To put it in another way it can help in creating a comparative analysis of changes that occurred during and after the virus and revealing ways of improvements. The analysis will be done based on a governmental report of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation which gathered data for 2019 and 2020 at five hundred eighty universities in the country. One hundred thirty professors, ten thousand nine hundred eighty-three students participated in interviews at the end of March 2020.
1.2.1.1 Internet penetration in Russia
The Russian Federation is country with a good level of development and most people are using digital devices in daily life. According to Statista, the population from 12 to 44 years
are advanced Internet users as the share of people who use the Internet in Russia is not lower than 90% of the total amount of people in these age categories. (see Fig. 1.) Also “the average age of first-year students was approximately 20-
24, and the current age is 17-21”. (Sommer, 2018) Undoubtedly, the main percentage of people in those age categories of those who are potential university students have digital devices and are able to apply them in daily life and theoretically for education purposes.
That allows supposing that the dominant number of Russian students were ready for the transaction to digital communication platforms in educational processes. However, the situation with professors can differ from students.
Figure 1. Share of population using the internet in Russia in December 2019, by age group (Statista, 2020)
Indeed, it is significant to look at the shares of people by age who are living in Russia in order to understand the percent of the young population who are the main part of those who are studying at universities. It allows making an analysis that the dominant part of the population is from 15 to 64 years who are in 66.75% from of demographic statistics from the total amount of people in Russia in 2019. (Statista, 2020) This age is the most suitable for studying and teaching at universities. It determines that the thesis is covering the biggest part of the population in the researched country. Another key point is that the percentage of Internet penetration and respectively usage of digital communication platforms are going down in conformity with age. However, the peak of the statistics is among those who have from 25 – 34 years and later there is percentage reduction. (see Fig.2.) Moreover, as it was mentioned before first-years students usually have 17-21 years and as a rule, the education at university takes from 4 to 6 years. (Sommer, 2018) As a result, students usually have from 17 to 26 years and people out of this age group were calculated in amount around 13-14 million in Russia. (see Fig.2.) According to World Bank, the Russian population was around 144.5 million at the end of 2018, which means that a comparatively high proportion of people are being considered in the paperwork. (World Bank, 2018) At the same time, the average age of professors at universities is higher than 67 years what also plays a
tremendous role in the analysis itself and in a transaction from offline to online model of education under coronavirus conditions. (ROI, 2016)
Figure 2. Male and female population in Russia by age (Jan,1.2020) (Statista, 2020)
1.2.1.2 The use of digital communication platforms by universities
With attention to the average age of a student, what means that he is in groups of the people with the highest numbers of users (see. Fig. 1 on p. X), and the professors whose average age is higher than 67 years and who are in the group with the lowest index. This statistic indicates that there is a disproportion of the Internet and digital communication platforms users. What is the most interesting is that the group who are responsible for teaching have less than 50 percent of the Internet users. Important to realize, that 60 percent of professors at universities said that they had no experience with teaching online classes.
(Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) Certainly, it was almost impossible to predict that the situation with coronavirus will occur and there was no possibility to create any special preparation for professors for future digital communication platforms usage. The most compelling evidence of not perfect readiness is that 3,2 out of 5 professors evaluated their abilities to use social networks. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) However, it does not look paradoxically as the average age of professors has not so big index of internet penetration.
At the beginning of 2019, there were only 14 universities where students had the possibility to study online without physical presence. (Chumak, 2019) The total number of universities is 741 in the Russian Federation. (Study in Russia, 2020) It means that only 1,8 percent of universities in a country had previous experience with online classes and usage of digital communication platforms in teaching people. Definitely, this number is not so high, but most of the universities started to use digital communication platforms long before coronavirus. To be more precise, those networks were used for uploading study materials, lections, books, and for communicating with students by answering their questions.
(Goryachev, 2015) Among such study platforms, there were Moodle, Edmodo, Blackboard, and others. (Goryachev, 2015) Nevertheless, most of the universities did not use any digital communication platforms at least for cooperation between students and professors. As a result, if students needed to contact a teacher they had to go to the university or ask for the private email of a professor.
Such disbalance exists partly due to lack of financial help at provincial universities or at universities that are not in top-ranking in Russia. (Borisova, 2017) Among top universities are MGIMO, HSE, BMSTU, SPbU, MSU, NSU, TSU, and others; most of them are located in Moscow (6 out of 10 universities in the top – ranking). (Top Universities, 2018) Those institutions are getting more government subsidies than others. (Borisova, 2017) As a consequence, they have more possibilities on procurement of new equipment, study courses for professors where they will get knowledge of how to use digital communication platforms or to buy access to well-known digital communication platforms for online education or integration students and professors. One of the brightest examples is MGIMO which is applying online sources in education. They provide access for their students and professors to a variety of libraries such as Book.ru, Znanium.com, and the University online library.
(MGIMO, 2020) Talking about social networks, the university gives access to the full version of Polycom, Zoom, Skype, and others what is required for collaboration with help of video conferences. (MGIMO, 2020) In this case, students and professors will accept the transition from offline to online model of education fast and easily as they had experience before.
Comparatively, another university which is not located in Moscow such as YSPU has no access to Skype, Zoom, Microsoft Teams, or any other social networks. (YSPU, 2020) However, they have some study laptops, access to the electronic study portal of the university, libraries, licenses of Microsoft Windows, and many others. (YSPU, 2020) Nevertheless, the accesses are only possible from some university’s classes and those laptops are suited at YSPU only. (YSPU, 2020)
A considerable number of universities in Russia are not located in Moscow or Saint Peterburg, they are not in top – rankings. As a result, they get fewer subsidies from the government, they have less motivation to develop, and they don’t have the opportunity to evolve from offline to online schools. In fact, there is high inequality in the development of universities’ digital education and usage of digital communication platforms for study purposes. What is more, geographical location also plays a big role in the development and application of new technologies, as it is in the case of MGIMO university in Russia. These factors influence the ability of students and professors to use digital communication platforms and adapt rapidly to remote collaboration with each other during coronavirus situation.
1.2.2 Situation after quarantine
As it was already written before some part of the secondary information is based on the government report. The same number of professors as it was at the end of May and twenty- four thousand four hundred twenty-eight students participated in the interview process at the end of May 2020 for a governmental report of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation. In addition, there were forty-five rectors of Russian
universities who were questioned on the given topic of universities’ readiness for education through social networks. What is more, almost three million emails for social media were also considered for the final outcomes of the report. As it was mentioned before the period after quarantine is counted from the beginning of May 2020 due to the reason that the government of the country does not organize lockdown after that period due to many different reasons which will be discussed in detail in further subchapters.
1.2.2.1 University infrastructure and teacher’s awareness in social networks
The university infrastructure and teacher’s ability to use social networks and the Internet are varying from university to university but a common situation shows that most of the professors are not happy with following changes in the sphere of education. There are some factors that are influencing that. On the one side, the technical staff could provide support to pedagogues in this coronavirus period, however, the number of such people at universities is not so large. Hence, the resources will only be enough to develop standard solutions and support a small part of interested professors. At the same time, the rest of the teachers have to be content with the technological solutions available at the university in the form of learning management system (LMS) platforms or the delivery of content by e- mail to students.
It is impossible to have online learning without information technologies which need to have some investment flows on the education of professors in the usage of social networks and teach people online. The investment should also be done of development of the online platform for students and professors or for purchasing full access to already known social network in order to provide a better quality of collaboration and for many other tasks.
According to the Ministry of Education in Russia, “at the time of the transition to the distance format, about 19% of the teaching staff had problems with the equipment necessary for work, by the end of May the share of such teachers decreased to 13%”. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) Interesting to know that some students were not indifferent, and they voluntarily suggested organizing IT support for their pedagogues where twenty percent of professors got the help. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) “Digital volunteers assisted educators with setting up and using online platforms and assisting with related technical issues.”
(Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) Indeed, there were many professors who have not good equipment, laptops or computers, for better cooperation with students. Some had problems with the absence of a camera required for qualified video conferences or online classes. As has been noted universities did not provide personal laptops for each of the pedagogues but only suggested using computers at universities. Henceforth, teaches needed to come to universities in order to use these laptops or computers, however, this could endanger their health as they could get infected by coronavirus being at universities or even getting to it.
Around 13 percent of universities in the Russian Federation was not equipped with a good level of infrastructure, it included cloud storages, high-speed Internet, and digital systems for the management of the education process. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) Even when most universities have LMSs, but less than half of them is using the systems. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) Straightaway, about 80 high schools out of 741 had digital infrastructure suitable for
taking distance lessons and for publishing required materials for them in a school server.
As a matter of fact, 88,51 percent of universities’ dormitories provided the Internet for their students. Under those circumstances, the education system was not ready for the 2020 challenge, namely to the teaching of students during quarantine due to the coronavirus. This outcome pushed the government of the country to reconstruct the sharing of budget and pay more attention to the digital infrastructure of universities.
1.2.2.2 The use of digital communication platforms by universities
Under coronavirus circumstances, universities were forced to choose one of the most suitable ways for teaching students. There were some options for that, the first one was to transfer the learning process for some specialization to the next study year, to send students tasks online and ask them to send homework back to professors, while teachers will also recommend the list of literature required for doing the homework. The last method was to have standard online lections where pedagogues will explain material by themselves and all students will be able to watch it live and ask questions about it. Surely, the last way makes the lives of students much easier and is saving time spent at universities. Also, this way of education requires the use of digital communication platforms through which the contact between professor and students will be possible. Such platforms as Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Blue Jeans, BlackBoard, and many others allow to have video conferences for more than 2 and more people, however, some of them ask for additional payments for it. Henceforth, this access should be financed by someone.
According to the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, 44 percent of Russian universities have admission to social networks, such as Zoom, which allows making video conferences. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) Nevertheless, not all of those universities were using this admission during distance learning. As it was already written before there were three possible ways for teaching students in the pandemic situation and only twenty-eight percent of high schools used social networks. Among those universities, there were some which opened accesses to various online libraries and even some had an agreement with international book storages. Some months later in April, more universities started to use digital communication platforms for educating students, and fifty-seven percent of people studied through online conferences. What is more, through one month this number was increased even more to 83 percent in higher education. It was reached by tutoring professors or some disciplines to teach their subject through Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and others. This seventeen percent are existing due to such subjects which were not able to teach online such as physical training which is still mandatory subject for most of the universities in the Russian Federation.
In details, the most used platform was electronic mails what is suitable for the first method of education during the quarantine. This method was used by more than half percent of students, on the next place there is Zoom platform, which was popular among sixty-four percent of people, on the third place is the learning management system. (see Fig. 3.) The last one is done by universities and almost 61,1 percent applied them in education. (see Fig.
3.) Another social network is Moodle which is used by 27,9 percent for better integration between professors and students. (see Fig. 3.) What is more, other digital communication platforms as WhatsApp, VKontakte, Facebook, and others were used for communication in
48 percent. (see Fig. 3.) Undoubtedly, such proportions can vary from university to university based on the way of education which was chosen by the management of a university. Every university chose the most comfortable way for educating students, however, most of them rely on their internal infrastructure, financial facilities, students and teachers’ abilities to collaborate online, and common permissibility system which will eliminate any violations of external and internal rules in the educational institutions in Russia.
Figure 3. Usage of digital communication platforms in distance learning in Russia during coronavirus quarantine (Aleshkovsky, 2020)
What is more, the researched data can vary and, for example, Alexander Serikov who is a representative of OSP journal got a little bit different data in his survey with students.
According to the source, when professors were working remotely with students, they were using systems of electronic education, but the most popular communication tool was WhatsApp. (Serikov, 2020) “The survey also noted the high mobility and responsiveness of social networks, especially when it comes to message boards and platforms for the exchange of information between teachers and students.” (Serikov, 2020) Also, digital communication platforms replace here the lack of personal communication of students in a group during the full-time study. What is more, communication tools in training were also noted by Zoom what was around fifty percent (and as it was written before respondents rated the capabilities of Zoom by the training methods used for streams of 100 people lasting no more than 40 minutes), there were forty-three percent of respondents voted for Skype, Instagram was thirty-nine percent and thirty-eight voted for Webinar, Big Blue Button, Google Hangouts and Proficonf together. (Serikov, 2020)
1.2.2.3 Adaptation to a new format of education
Definitely, the adaptation process can be different for people depending on their previous experience with online education and usage of social networks. Not every professor was sure of the effectiveness of digital education, but there were some people who said that such a
way is even much comfortable than the traditional one. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) Surely, the adaptation is lying not only on students and teachers but also on the management of universities and governmental organizations which are responsible for organization study process in the most comfortable way for all the participants of education. In particular, there was only sixty percent of universities designed web pages for professors at universities that were aimed to support them during coronavirus. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) According to the Ministry of education in Russia, this was organized fast and all of the universities got access to theoretical material for teaching online. The generous part of professors at least once used them, and it led to the cooperation of professors in specialized web chats where they shared their experience with each other in a new way of studying. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) The beginning of quarantine was at the end of March, at this time many universities decided to take control into their hands and to create a way for further education of students.
Nevertheless, some high schools were afraid to do any independent activities and were waiting for a solution from the government. (RBC, 2020) The reason for that can be high power distance and a high level of bureaucracy. The proportion of such universities is 70/30 where seventy universities started their first actions for using digital communication platforms by themselves and thirty universities which were waiting for the solution from others. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) However, students and professors underlined lack of communication and disability to get the required information from each other. Especially such a problem was at the beginning of the quarantine period, but it was partially solved.
Some universities started to post various information on their web pages which could be helpful for students and even teacher during online education. (RBC, 2020) Nevertheless, forty-five percent of students and sixty-eight percent of professors confirmed that university gives them not enough information for online or even self-education. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020)
Opinion of teachers was divided based on the program which they teach and those who used digital communication platforms even before coronavirus quarantine. Teachers who instructed people to practical activities such as work with airplane simulator, train, assembly of machines, artists, musicians, sportsmen, and many other professional tasks, were against online education. However, the situation obliges professors to adapt and to create a way of teaching such professions. For instance, artists and people from creative sciences got their homework by email and sent photos of finished works back. (Vesti, 2020) Another example is sportsmen who trained directly in front of a camera in video chats with their trainers. (KGUFKST, 2020) Another group of professors who used digital communication platforms even before the quarantine adopted rapidly and even improved their abilities. There were defined 25 percent of such teachers and 40 percent of them were from top-ranking universities. (Minobrnauki.gov, 2020) Nevertheless, the greater number of pedagogues (seventy-five percent) were not among advanced users what created a problem in the transition process.
The most compelling evidence is that at the beginning of spring 2020 there was discussed such a topic as "Modern digital educational environment in the Russian Federation" by representatives in the educational sphere of the Russian Federation. (Shuvalova, 2020) The main part of this discussion was about the issue of the lack of domestic electronic educational resources. According to this meeting, now students have access to online
courses in one of the state web educational pages, online.edu.ru, where about 1 thousand courses are available. (Shuvalova, 2020) Today, through one year after this discussion, this number is even higher. Correspondingly, there are other web pages for self – education and one of the most popular foreign platforms is Coursera which has more than thirty thousand various courses. (Shuvalova, 2020) Nonetheless, universities had to decide which digital platforms to use directly for organizing distance learning activities. Undoubtedly, those universities which used electronic educational resources and had different elements of distance learning in educational programs before coronavirus quarantine turned out to be in a more advantageous position than other educational institutions in Russia.
As a consequence, there is a number of problems associated with the use of the educational process of the universities. For instance, there is a low level of motivation and competence of teachers in the field of information and communication technologies. Although, a high degree of teacher labor in organizing and supporting the learning process, but they are frequently lacking open access to digital communication platforms from classrooms. By the same talking, there were much more problems with this adaptation to a new format of universities’ work which would be discussed in further chapters.
Indeed, most universities strengthened cooperation with each other in time of the transition of universities to online learning. This cooperation was improved also with national education authorities, representatives of educational platforms, and international organizations. In addition, organizations provided each other methodological support in how to use digital tools in learning and they shared up-to-date educational courses. There were organized informal groups of students, teachers, and university administrators and it was created on various platforms. This supported solving their problems in terms of online learning with help of discussion. As an illustration of gradual improvements, the number of online offers for pieces of training was increased and now absolutely different people who want to get new knowledge from different spheres can do it and it is available for various categories of activities. The process was also organized online through social networks.
1.3 How digital communication platforms influence the choice of university applicants
Undoubtedly, the Internet is the main source of information that people daily absorb. Every person is seeking to get knowledge on various topics and digital communication platforms platform are useful tools for that task. Applying them in a search there is an opportunity to get as much as possible as most of the businesses, governmental organizations, commonwealths, people, and many others have digital communication platforms channels in Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Slack, BlackBoard, Moodle, and so on. There are two common reasons why universities are maintaining their social networks. The first one is to be a good source of information for current students, to support them in internal communication with professors and to a platform for distance learning, while the second reason is to have introductory pages for new applicants or, generally speaking, for people who are planning to study at the exact university on of their programs. (Kelly, 2010)
Interesting to know that recent studies have shown that today youth people trust the information which they receive through social media and networks more than traditional media or advertisement. (Kelly, 2010) Also, there have been proved that digital communication platforms have the greatest influence in decision-making for most deals including the choice of university. Surely, the situation was dramatically changed even with help of coronavirus quarantine as freshly graduated pupils and any other people who were interested in higher education did not have the opportunity to go to the university on open days. Nevertheless, the management of universities has created a digital form of communication with applicants through social media services by uploading various videos, photos, and information on their official social media accounts. (Agranovich, 2020) Moreover, some high schools have an online platform on Instagram where there is a chat for communication of people and for asking questions to university representatives.
Additionally, those representatives were showing the universities’ campuses what demonstrated a full picture for applicants. (Agranovich, 2020) This was similar to the usual offline open day where applicants could see the internal situation in the exact university and ask interested him questions.
According to Kelly Louise, people started to spend more time on social media and networks rather than on reading newspapers or watching TV, especially it is related to young people who are the main group of students in the Russian Federation. They trust more digital communication platforms rather than other channels of advertisements. (Kelly, 2010) As a key point for attracting more students, universities in Russia can try to adopt international experience. Using hashtags current students can write their stories, opinion, experience about university life and it will provide different from official information for applicants.
For example, the hashtag #oxtweets is used by students of Oxford University who tells about their life at the university. (Ismagilova, 2018) Another example is Swansea University which has created the #SwanseaGrad hashtag that can help prospective students feel like a graduate of the institution. (Ismagilova, 2018) Such a technic can help to attract people to study at the university especially it is needed in order to increase financing at high schools.
Definitely, there is a high level of competitiveness between universities to gain as many new students as it is possible. Nevertheless, there are some high schools that have never suffered from a lack of people who wish to be a part of the university life at those schools. However, a dominant number of universities are participating in the competition with the main prize:
to attract as many enrollees as it is possible. (Borisova, 2017) As a result, those universities were forced to realize their marketing activities during quarantine time when those activities were especially actual as we as March and April are the months when days of open doors are taking part. (Ismagilova, 2018) Speaking about competitiveness in that sphere, marketers of each university should have a marketing plan which in usual times included standard points. The first one is to organize days of open doors; the second one is social media advertisement and to support and develop universities' web pages. The crucial factor to have them informative and to reach an idea when people can easily navigate on them.
The third one is when universities’ representatives visit last year classes, give to schoolchildren brochures, show presentations, web page and talk about the place which they represent. (Ismagilova, 2018) The fourth way to attract pupils is to send informative brochures to local universities and ask teachers to spread them among students. (Borisova, 2017) Those two methods can work when universities’ representatives come to schools with
enhancement to preparation on one exact major; for example, representatives of the economic university come to schools where children study more economics, mathematics, and others. The last one is to ask the teaching staff of a university to conduct open lessons for students inside of schools what will be as one of the marketing activities which can help in attracting new smart students who will possibly in a future glorify their universities.
(Borisova, 2017)
However, some actions which were listed in the previous paragraph were not feasible in a time of quarantine and even now at the beginning of 2021, not all universities have offline classes. As a consequence, those marketing approaches were changed in the online direction. However, now schools’ students are studying offline and only some universities are working online, but still, those quarantine conditions invert the whole model of attracting pupils as enrollees at universities. As most of the introductory, informative, and persuasive activities are organized dominantly online rather than offline as some universities’ professors and representatives are afraid to come to schools where more than 20 people are located in one small room. Due to the fact that it can be unsafety during coronavirus infection.
Most of the attempts which were listed before were used by some universities during the coronavirus quarantine, despite the fact that it was not so long in comparison with other countries but enrollee students and teachers were quickly adapted to a new way of collaboration. Nonetheless, most of the universities denied the idea to strongly target potential students online and were waiting until the situation will be changed. Fortunately, it was beneficial for them as the quarantine ended fast and they could continue their traditional activities of marketing. Nevertheless, it was positive for traditional adherents who did not want to have digital development as well as a dominant number of professors at Russian universities are people who are older than sixty years old and are not adapted to computerization. That was the main issue which influenced on universities of the Russian Federation during the world digitalization of education on all levels both for schools and universities.
However, there is some threat as there is a risk of stumbling upon non-existent universities with fake pages on social networks, fake reviews, and fake diplomas. Therefore, it is not advisable to fill out applications on questionable sites or pages despite the reliability of Internet communications, the safety and security of personal information. Consequently, students can get valuable and reliable data online, but they should always remember to only look for verified Facebook, Twitter, and other accounts. Their addresses can usually be found on the official pages of universities along with accurate and up-to-date information on specialties, tuition fees, and subjects.
1.4 Online learning as an educational technology
The modern digital society is characterized by high rates of technological development that have an impact on all areas of activity. The system of education is the most sensitive to innovations and the rate of knowledge renewal is tremendous. What is more important that now the most priority task of education is to develop the student's ability to independently
