Education is very important in our life. The quality of a country's future life, commercially; industrially and intellectually, depends on the quality of its educational system.
An educated person is one who knows a lot about many things. He always tries to learn, find out, and discover more about the world around him. He gets knowledge at school, from books, magazines, from TV educational programs. The result of the educative process is the capacity for Further education.
Russians have always shown a great concern for education. The right to education is stated in the Constitution of the Russian Federation. It is ensured by compulsory secondary schools, vocational schools, and higher education establishments. It is also ensured by the development of extramural and evening courses and the system of state scholarships and grants.
Education in Russia is compulsory up to the 9th form inclusive. The stages of compulsory schooling in Russia are: primary education for ages 6-7 to 9-10 inclusive; secondary education including intermediate school for ages 10-11 to 12-13 inclusive, and senior school for ages 13-14 to 14-15 inclusive, If a pupil of a secondary school wishes to go on in higher education, he or she must stay at school for two more years. Primary and secondary school together comprise 11 years of study. Every school has a "core curriculum" of academic subjects, such as Russian, Literature, Mathematics, History, a foreign language and others. Lyceums and gymnasiums offer programs giving a profound knowledge in some fields of study.
After finishing the 9th form one can go on to a vocational school which offers programmes of academic subjects and a programme of training in a technical field, or a profession.
After finishing the 11th form of a secondary school, a lyceum or a gymnasium one can go on in higher education. All applicants must take competitive examinations. Higher education institutions, that is, institutes or universities, offer a 5-year programme of academic subjects for undergraduates in a variety of fields, as well as a postgraduate course. If one finishes a postgraduate course and writes a thesis, he or she receives a candidate's degree or a doctoral degree.
All secondary schools, institutes and universities until recently have been funded by the state, now there is quite a number of private fee-paying primary and secondary schools; some universities have fee-paying departments.