YAKUTSK, February 3. /TASS/. Russia’s Ministry of Education recommended to Arctic regions to begin training teaches for nomadic schools and kindergartens. The students will be representatives of the local communities of low-numbered indigenous peoples.
Yakutia’s leader of the Center for Nomadic Education Natalia Sitnikova, who had supervised a working group on the new document, told TASS about the new recommendations.
Nomadic schools in the Arctic regions are a part of the Education National Project. Earlier, the Agency for Development of Human Resources in the Far East and Arctic reported plans to support nomadic education - including support for children in nomadic or partially nomadic families.
"Russia’s Ministry of Education has approved the recommendations referring to education of children in families of the North’s low-numbered indigenous peoples, who are nomadic or semi-nomadic. Those recommendations have been introduced by our center. We stress that educational programs and their regulations should focus on the specific features of nomadic schools," Sitnikova said.
Human resources
The document recommends fixing background numbers of students, who will study working at nomadic schools and kindergartens. The training, which could be distanced, will be aimed at nomadic or semi-nomadic parents, foster parents, members of the local ethnic communities. This recommendation refers to regional authorities, the expert added.
In Yakutia, the training programs will be organized by a local pedagogical college. "Take for example Finland, where they have short-term courses for all mothers. We also should develop such an approach. The international experience shows that teachers for nomadic schools should be representatives of the local communities. This approach could be a solution for the sector’s shortage of human resources."
However, nomadic education conflicts legal regulations. "The requirements for them are equal to those applicable to regular schools. The new recommendations ease excessive requirements for nomadic schools. For example, the requirement to have an alarm button in the tent, used for lessons. We have mentioned earlier the case with the school in the Nizhnekolysmsky District, which was closed because it did not have telephones or a fire alarm button," she said.
Education formats
According to the expert, regulations for nomadic schools should be reflected in federal laws on education. "Regarding many requirements we insist it is written in the law: "with the exception for nomadic schools." This approach has been used in the legislation on foster families: before that addendum, the herders often experienced problems with taking care of children, as the law’s requirement was - the parents should have a separate flat or room for an adopted child. Clearly, this regulation could not be observed by a nomadic family," she said.
She continued by stressing - in Russia’s some regions children leave families at the age of two: to receive pre-school, and later on secondary education. "This way, the children grow into marginal: they are not aware of herder routes, they cannot live the nomadic life. They see parents only during holidays - this is not enough," she said.
Nomadic schools will favor from improvement of the distance education technologies, the scientist said. "Nomadic training should be available in all grades of secondary school," she continued. "The herders’ children want to be next to parents, they enjoy the freedom of traveling. By offering respective educational resources and technologies available in the tundra, we can change the situation in deer breeding."
Modern technologies
With the satellite communication’s low traffic and high costs, the expert said, it would be best to use an offline electronic technology, where students receive uploaded programs for lessons at home. On the other hand, deer herders, as a rule, cannot afford their children use gadgets during nomadic seasons, as the amount of electricity depends directly on affordable fuel.
"Clearly, the herders do not have enough fuel to have their children use laptops or pads for learning," the expert said. "I am confident, they should be offered additional incentives. The current norms have to be reviewed."
Besides, education of Arctic students may have more innovative approaches, a coordinator of the Expert Center for the Arctic Development (PORA) Alexander Vorotnikov said.
"For these purposes we could use the mobile models of the Quantorium Technopark," he said. "Those innovations must be reflected in the federal legislation."
According to him, the problems of nomadic schools should be represented in the regional parts of the federal projects, which make the Education National Project - those are the projects like Digital Educational Environment, Modern School, and New Opportunities for All.
"In my opinion, all these aspects should be addressed in the developing system of the Arctic education, which relies on specific space, climate and cultural features of those regions," he said.
Nomadic education
According to the information from eight regions, filed with the Ministry of Education in 2019-2020, Russia’s 4,676 families are traditional families of the North’s low-numbered indigenous peoples. The nomadic families have 6,569 children, where 2,200 are of the pre-school age, and 4,300 are of the school age.
Nomadic and semi-nomadic families receive social support. They do not have to pay for their children’s boarding schools or for their return air fares to those schools.