Serhii Belykov: «The analysis allows us to assess the state of ZGIA as critical»

The question of reorganization of the Zaporizhzhia State Engineering Academy by inclusion in the Zaporizhzhia National Technical University arose in connection with the deep systemic crisis of ZGIA as a higher education institution of the III-IV level of accreditation, which is reflected in the report of the commission of the State Inspection of Higher Education Institutions of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The conclusions of the commission after the discussion at the personnel commission of MONU served as the basis for the termination of the contract with the rector of ZGIA VI Pozhuev. Analysis of these conclusions and discussion of the academy’s activities together with the acting director. of the rector, E.Ya. Shvets, allows us to assess the state of ZGIA as critical.

For four years, the contingent decreased by 46 percent

For 2009-2013 the contingent of ZGIA students in absolute terms decreased from 8,278 to 4,474 people, i.e. by 46 percent. If we take into account the ratio of the contingent of full-time and part-time students, then at ZGIA 35 percent are inpatient students and 65 percent – extramural students For comparison, at ZNTU, 61 percent of diary students and 39 percent of extramural students…

The refusal of the academy’s management to accept a budgetary order for part-time education and the reduction of budgetary admissions at the full-time department led to a critical decrease in the number of students at ZGIA.

In 2013, 346 people per day and 190 people per day were admitted to ZGIA. – for correspondence forms of education. In 2014, 452 inpatient students and 587 part-time students are expected to graduate. This will lead to a further drop in absolute indicators of the contingent by 503 people or by 11 percent.

For comparison, in 2013, ZNTU admitted 1,752 people. per day uniform and 814 people. – for correspondence form of education. When graduating in 2014, respectively, 1,522 people. and 694 people, the growth of the absolute indicators of the contingent by 350 people is expected.

In ZHYA, the number of students per teacher decreased to 7.45 [with a further decrease to 7.1] with a general trend of progressive increase of this indicator to 18 [Program of actions of the President of Ukraine]. At ZNTU, this indicator reaches 12.71, and further increases to 13.1.

For the first course in the specialties «Water supply and drainage», «Metallurgy of non-ferrous metals», «Press processing of metals». not a single student was accepted for full-time education, and in the specialties «Finance and Credit» and «Labor Protection» – only two (!) full-time students each…

Because of the catastrophic drop in the contingent in the specialty «Metallurgy of non-ferrous metals» 13 students of I-IV courses are taught by ten teachers of the profiling department.

Licenses for most referral training expire

The critical situation regarding the contingent of students in the majority of programs and specialties of ZGIA is aggravated by the fact that on July 1, 2014, the license for 16 out of 18 programs for bachelors and 27 out of 37 specialties for training specialists and masters expires on July 1, 2014.

Specialists who do not correspond to the profile of these departments continue to perform the duties of heads of departments with scientific specialties…

The preserved supporting departments of ZGIA [foreign languages, philosophy and political science, physical education and sports, Ukrainian science] do not meet the requirements of the Law of Ukraine «On Higher Education»…

For many years, the academy did not have the practice of working with graduates colleges that are part of it. The program for college graduates to obtain full higher education on the basis of a junior specialist diploma on a budgetary basis was not implemented. In 2013, ZGIA accepted only ten college graduates for budgetary education, and ZNTU – 315 college graduates.

According to the data of the Scopus scientific database as of October 15, 2013, ZGIA dropped to 113th place among Ukrainian universities, while ZNTU rose to 40th place, moving up nine positions.

Violations established by the state commission

As a result of the inspection of ZGIA by the commission of the State Inspectorate of Educational Institutions of Ukraine, gross violations of the Law of Ukraine «On higher education», Regulations on the organization of the educational process, industry standards of higher education, including:

• complete exclusion of exams as a form of semester control;
• arbitrary reduction of volumes of regulatory disciplines;
• the amount of credits [study hours] of study plans in all directions and specialties is half less normative;
• nine teaching laboratories and six specialized offices were liquidated.

This objective assessment of the decline in the quality of training, the number of students, and the number of teaching staff allows us to draw a conclusion about the possible prospect of revoking the license of ZGIA in most areas and specialties, the term of which expires on July 1, 2014.

Academies are offered maximum autonomy

Therefore, the reorganization of ZGIA and ZNTU was proposed with the preservation of maximum autonomy of ZGIA, including: preservation of the name, symbols, flag and other attributes of the academy, autonomous bodies of self-government, introduction of the position of the first vice-rector – academy directors, etc. The creation of a system of institutes uniting related faculties, the election of institute directors as officials and the assignment of strategic development tasks to them, and the deans of faculties – tasks of direct management of teaching and student teams.

The reorganization of higher education institutions should ensure a significant increase in the quality of specialist training, the development of scientific schools, a significant strengthening of the teaching staff, the creation of specialized academic councils for the defense of doctoral and candidate theses in new specialties, an increase in the rating of the higher technical education of the Zaporizhzhia region, obtaining decisions of the Ministry of Education and Culture on extending the validity of licenses and certificates for the unified university for two to three years in order to preserve all specialties of ZGIA.

The main conditions ensuring the preservation of the teaching staff and the salary level during the reorganization of ZGIA are summarized in the draft agreement of the staffs of teachers and students of ZNTU and ZGIA.

With the participation of Acting rector of the Zaporizhzhia Metallurgical and Zaporizhzhia Hydropower Colleges of the Zaporizhzhia State University of Technology Shvets E. Ya. held a meeting of the collectives, which almost unanimously decided to apply to the Ministry of Education and Culture for the reorganization of these colleges into structural subdivisions of the ZNTU.

Reorganization is calmly perceived by sane people

However, the prospect of reorganization of the higher technical educational institutions of Zaporizhzhia, which is calmly perceived by sane teachers and the student body, began to receive a tendentious assessment in the mass media and social networks from a group of irresponsible phrasers… This group, using the mass media, appeals to the people’s deputies of Ukraine, falsifies reliable information about the state of affairs at ZGIA and ZNTU, proposing for career reasons either preserve the current state of crisis of ZGIA, or reorganize the academy into a structural subdivision of one of the universities of Dnipropetrovsk.

He deeply respects the history of ZGIA, the merits of its staff and rectors, prof. Yu.M. Potebna and M.P. Revuna, as the chairman of the Council of rectors of universities of the III-IV level of accreditation of the Zaporizhzhia region, I am concerned about its current state of crisis and the possibility of liquidation of the academy due to non-compliance with the licensing requirements for most specialties of this university.

I ask you, when considering the issue of the reorganization of ZGIA and ZNTU, to pay attention to the urgent need for a significant improvement in the quality of higher education and the training of highly qualified specialists for the city of Zaporizhzhia and the Zaporizhzhia region, which can only be provided by a powerful unified technical university of national status with the highest state and academic ratings.

S.B. Belykov,
Chairman of the Council of Rectors, Rector of ZNTU

We offer a selection of documents for download:

Letter of the rector of the Zaporizhzhia National Technical University Belykov Serhiy Borysovych to the people’s deputies of Ukraine (PDF, 1.5 MB)
Appendix 1 (PDF, 10.0 MB)
Appendix 2 (PDF, 99.2 KB)
Appendix 3 (PDF, 236.6 KB)
Appendix 3a (PDF, 199.6 KB)
Appendix 4 (PDF, 97.1 KB)
Appendix 5 (PDF, 97.6 KB)
Appendix 6 (PDF, 2.5 MB)
ZNTU license (PDF, 2.59 MB)
Appendix 7 (PDF, 92.7 KB)
Appendix 8 (PDF, 111.8 KB)
Appendix 8a (PDF, 572.9 KB)
Appendix 9 (PDF, 412.3 KB)
Appendix 10 (PDF, 394.4 KB)
Appendix 11 (PDF, 601.2 KB)
Appendix 12 (PDF, 117.1 KB)
Appendix 13 (PDF, 139.1 KB)
Appendix 14 (PDF, 255.5 KB)
Appendix 15 (PDF, 488.5 KB)