Ministry of Education (Russia)

• 1. Introduction

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  The Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation carries a Russian name that, translated literally, means Ministry of Enlightenment. That difference between "education" and "enlightenment" is not a minor translation choice. Today the ministry controls every state school curriculum in Russia and governs institutions of professional and vocational education. It also sets the rules for how schools, parents, legal guardians, and students interact when circumstances become difficult. How did an institution with roots in imperial Russia survive revolution, Soviet reorganization, and the collapse of the USSR? And why, as recently as 2018, was it being established under this specific name for the first time in post-Soviet history? Its offices sit at Karetny Ryad 2 in Moscow's Tverskoy District, but the answers stretch back much further.

• 2. Faith and the Founding

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  the 8th of September 1802 marks the founding of Russia's first centralized education ministry, established under the name Ministry of National Education. From its earliest years, the institution's scope extended well beyond classrooms. In 1817, it absorbed the Main Directorate of Spiritual Affairs of Foreign Faiths. That incorporation changed the ministry's name to the Ministry of Religious Affairs and Public Education, a title it carried until 1824. That seven-year fusion of schooling and faith governance reveals something about how the imperial state conceived of education. It was not treated as a purely secular enterprise. The 1824 separation returned education to its own dedicated ministry. A ministry structure that had survived intact for more than a hundred years would be replaced when the Bolshevik government took power.

• 3. Narkompros and the Soviet Network

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  In November 1917, the Bolshevik government established the People's Commissariat for Education, known by its abbreviation as Narkompros RSFSR. Russia's ministry tradition was set aside. From 1937 onward, the commissariat's structure extended into three layers below the central level. Regional departments called OblONO operated in Russia's regions; district departments called RayONO covered the districts; city departments called GoroNO handled urban education. That three-tier apparatus remained in place for more than fifty years, until 1989. In March 1946, the commissariat era gave way to more familiar language: Narkompros was renamed the Ministry of Education of the RSFSR. In 1988, that ministry merged with the State Committee of the RSFSR for Vocational and Technical Education. The result was a new body officially abbreviated as Minobr RSFSR. That 1988 merger would take on an unexpected significance within just three years.

• 4. The Post-Soviet Tangle

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  When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the Russian Republic's Ministry of Education inherited a double legacy. It became the legal successor not only to its own RSFSR predecessor, but also to the USSR State Committee for Public Education. That all-Union body had been assembled from three Soviet ministries. They were the USSR Ministry of Higher Education, the USSR Ministry of Education, and the USSR Ministry of Vocational and Technical Education. For a period until 1996, the new Russian ministry administered primary and secondary schooling, while separate bodies handled universities and science. The State Committee of the Russian Federation for Higher Education ran university affairs from 1993 to 1996. Before that, from 1991 to 1993, a separate Ministry of Science, Higher Education, and Technical Policy had held those responsibilities. In August 1996, those functions were folded together into a single Ministry of General and Vocational Education of the Russian Federation. That name survived only until May 1999, when the ministry was disbanded and the title Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation was restored. In 2004, a new presidential decree would reshape the entire ministry structure once more.

• 5. Science Added to the Portfolio

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  Decree No. 314, signed by the President of Russia on the 9th of March 2004, created the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation. The decree took effect the same day that Mikhail Fradkov's First Cabinet was established. The new ministry absorbed the functions of the outgoing Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation, which was abolished by the same decree. It also took on science-related responsibilities from the Ministry of Industry, Science, and Technology. The reorganized Russian Trademark Agency contributed further functions to the new structure. Oversight, law enforcement, and management functions in education, science, and intellectual property did not remain in the ministry itself. They were distributed to four federal services and agencies operating under the ministry's control. Two of those named in the decree were the Federal Service for Intellectual Property and the Federal Service for Supervision in Education and Science. Andrei Fursenko was named minister when the decree took effect. He had been serving as Acting Minister of Industry, Science, and Technology since November 2003. On the 21st of May 2012, youth policy functions were transferred to the ministry by presidential decree. That same decree transformed the Ministry of Sport, Tourism, and Youth Policy into a simpler Ministry of Sport of the Russian Federation. By the second half of the 2010s, voices inside Russian government were regularly calling for the ministry to be split in two.

• 6. Schooling Separated from Science

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  On the 15th of May 2018, the Russian Ministry of Education and Science was formally disbanded. In its place, two entirely separate ministries took shape. One, the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation, took responsibility for schools. The other, the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, assumed control of universities and research. Two agencies, Rosobrnadzor and Rosmolodyozh, were simultaneously removed from any ministry's oversight. Both were placed directly under the Government of the Russian Federation. The abbreviated name "Ministry of Education of Russia" did not transfer to the school-focused body. It was reassigned to the Ministry of Science and Higher Education. Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev described the reasoning in public remarks. He said the proposal was intended to "optimize the current system of government bodies." The goal, he added, was to "better concentrate our capabilities in developing both the one and the other education system." Vladimir Filippov, chair of the Higher Attestation Commission and a former Minister of Education himself, offered a different explanation. "In the large ministry," Filippov said, "schools felt like they were in a secondary role. The greatest attention was given to academics, respected figures, then to rectors, and only then were the problems of school principals dealt with. And that's wrong." Olga Vasilieva, who had led the combined ministry, was named the first minister of the newly separated school-focused body. Sergey Kravtsov has held the ministerial post since the 21st of January 2020.