2.1.3. Post-Soviet Nations

Technical and professional education has a long history in Russia and other post-Soviet nations. The Russian model includes vocational lyceums or secondary vocational education available at technical institutions [52]. No barriers exist for students who wish to complete undergraduate education after VET. However, the majority (62 percent) of students choose to pursue general secondary education (10th and 11th grades); about 20 percent of students pursue vocational training as part of secondary education [52]. In 2011, 53 percent of students in Russia completed tertiary education compared with 32 percent on average among OECD countries and 26 percent among G20 countries [53]. Such high achievement is primarily due to the country's historically substantial educational investment [53]. Additionally, Russia's entry rate into tertiary vocational education programs was 31 percent, remarkably higher than the average (19 percent) of OECD countries [53]. Russia had a history of factory-like higher education that has a substantial legacy in former Soviet, less-developed nations [54], including a few of the countries that provided sufficient data for this study.

The contrast between the EU and post-Soviet nations in education and economic development is stark. The end of the Cold War and the rise of fragile democracies in post-Soviet countries did not substantially alter the legacy of centralized planning and control in education. With the lingering Ukraine–Russia war, post-Soviet nations face severe challenges that could distract policymakers from engaging in cooperative educational and economic exchange to support the development of high-quality postsecondary programs aligned with economic growth.
