Attracting educational migrants to universities: an overview of institutional resources

Demographic evolution of Russia currently depends not only on the Russians’ reproductive behavior and government support measures for families, but also on migration policy. According to the Rosstat data (recalculated data considering the results of 2020 Russian census, given without statistics on the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR), Zaporozhye Oblast and Kherson Oblast)1, the country’s population of January 1, 2022 was 147.0 million people and of January 1, 2023 – 146.4 million people. Changes in the population for 2022 – 2023 are due to negative rate of natural increase (-594,557 people) and positive migration balance (61,920 people). We differentiate the state migration policy depending on migration flows and develop special tools to regulate and reduce social risks in each case (external, internal, return (Ryazantsev et al., 2015), labor, education migration, etc.).

In the context of demographic evolution, a promising direction of state policy is to encourage voluntary resettlement of compatriots to Russia, especially Russian-speaking (Russophones), as the language barrier will not hinder adaptation in the host community. Federal Law 99-FZ, dated May 24, 1999 “On the state policy of the Russian Federation concerning compatriots living abroad”2 and Presidential Decree 637, dated June 22, 2006 “On measures to assist voluntary resettlement of compatriots living abroad to the Russian Federation”3 define the concept of “compatriots”. All persons born in the Russian State, the Russian Republic, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, the USSR and the Russian Federation, as well as their descendants, have the right to obtain Russian citizenship, since these categories are culturally and historically close to Russians.

The largest number of compatriots live in the CIS countries (Republic of Azerbaijan, Republic of Armenia, Republic of Belarus, Kyrgyz Republic, Republic of Moldova, Republic of Kazakhstan, Republic of Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Republic of Uzbekistan, Ukraine), but the share of Russophones among them varies and depends on the status of the

Russian language in the country. G.I. Osadchaya, O.A. Volkova, T.N. Yudina, A.A. Kocherbaeva (Osadchaya et al., 2023) suggest classifying the degree of adaptation of migrants (in the case of Kyrgyz women) in Russian society: steadily adapted; unsteadily adapted; unsteadily deadapted; steadily deadapted. The researchers’ findings are of interest – the higher the degree of adaptation, the more migrants would like to stay to live in Russia.

We will base our interpretation of the concept of “adaptation” on the approach of W. Searle, C. Ward (Searle, Ward, 1990), who point out that intercultural studies are associated with the clarification of the terms “accommodation”, “acculturation”, “adjustment” and “adaptation”. As a result, it was the term “adaptation” that became widely used to study people’s intercultural experiences. Adaptation in a cross-cultural environment is behavioral and cognitive learning in the process of social and cultural interaction of a person with a new environment, resulting in psychological well-being and sociocultural competence as opposed to depression, social difficulties that may occur if the quantity and quality of social communications are reduced and the social distance between actors is increased.

Creating conditions is necessary to increase the adaptability of migrants, which is easiest to accomplish using the resources of educational migration, since during the period of study in higher education, the integration of actors into the host community proceeds more gently (this is due to the age of students and the active work of higher education institutions with foreign students). Longterm residence of foreign students from among compatriots in Russian cities can contribute to making an informed decision on acquiring Russian citizenship. It is necessary to comprehensively address the problems that may arise among foreign students in Russian universities, to improve programs of inclusion in society. We consider educational migration of foreign students from among compatriots as a resource for demographic evolution of Russia.

The aim of the work is to review the main resources of Russian universities to attract educational migrants, including compatriots. The object of the study is educational migration. The subject of the study is institutional resources of Russian universities used to attract educational migrants, including Russian-speaking compatriots (Russophones). In the context of demographic evolution, it is important to identify what institutional resources are formed and contribute to the decision of foreign applicants to make educational migration to Russia, since it is the knowledge of what hinders and promotes migration that makes it possible to develop well-founded management decisions.

Scientific approaches to the research topic

E. Lee divides the factors associated with the decision to migrate into two groups: push factors (inducing to leave the country of residence) and pull factors (attracting to a country for migration). The author clarifies that making the final decision is a search for a balance between a variety of conditions, positive, negative and neutral, observed in the countries of residence and migration (Lee, 1966). E. Lee’s theory is developed to explain labor migration flows, and it can be applied to understand the choice of a university and educational migration. The push or pull factors are, for example, the level of education in universities, employment prospects for graduates of different universities, the cost of education or the possibility of free education, the transparency of procedures for interaction with migration services, the rating of universities in leading rating agencies, the language of instruction, and others. On this basis, migration flows of applicants can move from one country to another.

E. Lee’s concept evaluates external factors and socio-economic conditions of labor at homecountry and abroad. With regard to labor migrants, E. Lee warns against simple summation of factors when identifying the reasons for migration, since actors do not like to leave their place of residence and subjectively assess positive and negative factors. With regard to educational migration, it is also necessary to refuse simplifications, but to take into account that school leavers are less attached to their place of residence, as they may seek separation from their parental family, they are not yet bound by marriage ties, and are in a situation when their peers also leave their places of residence. Thus, applicants are ready to change their usual way of life, and Russophone compatriots can strive for education in Russian.

The theory of V. Chirkov, M. Vansteenkiste, R. Tao, M. Lynch (Chirkov et al., 2007) is promising for research. The authors define two motivational factors influencing the decision of applicants to study abroad: the “preservation factor” (the goal is to avoid disadvantageous living conditions in their home country) and the “selfdevelopment factor” (the goal is to get an education and stay to build a career abroad) and consider intrinsic motivation, the psychology of actors.

L.L. Rybakovskii (Rybakovskii, 2017) offers a general theoretical scheme for explaining the motives for migration: it is necessary to distinguish between migration factors as objective conditions and migration reasons as an explanation of the actors’ subsequent reaction to the changes caused by the factors. In this case, factors precede causes, but when it comes to voluntary resettlement of Russophones in the Russian Federation, causes may become more significant than socio-economic, political factors.

Educational migration as a separate category of migration was considered by I.A. Bronnikov (Suvorova, Bronnikov, 2019), T.K. Rostovskaya, M.I. Skorobogatova (Rostovskaya, Skorobo- gatova, 2021), S.V. Ryazantsev (Ryazantsev, 2019; Ryazantsev et al., 2021), and V.M. Filippov (Filippov, 2015). Within the framework of these studies, the concept of educational migration has been given a meaning predetermined by the goals and objectives of the research. A generalizing definition of the concept of “migration educational policy” can be considered as follows – it is “a set of measures to ensure the effective attraction of professionals from abroad, deter the departure of qualified personnel from the country, repatriate migrants, create a system of national educational programs to support foreign education, as well as the development of joint inter-university programs to improve the reputation of the region in the field of educational services” (Rostovskaya et al., 2021).

Foreign studies of educational migration are conducted very intensively, especially in the UK and the USA, where educational migration is realized in accordance with the concept of “soft power” (Nye, 1990). “Soft power” is essentially a strategy of using adaptation technologies of actors to integrate them into the host community, which in some cases involves the transformation of actors’ values. However, the goal of “soft power” is not that the outcome of adaptation is a change of citizenship, but that the actors return to their home country and promote the ideas adopted during the period of education. Works of I. Vershinina, A. Kurbanov, N. Panich (Vershinina et al., 2016), S.Yu. Boldyreva, R.Yu. Boldyrev, N.N. Beloshitskaya (Boldyreva et al., 2020) are devoted to the resources of Russian universities to attract educational migrants and adaptation of foreign students within the framework of the implementation of the “soft power” strategy. Russian studies of international mobility in the context of internationalization, analyzing the impact of academic exchange on the development of human capital, are also relevant (Egorychev, Rostovskaya, 2021; Zakirova, Kharitonova, 2022; Rostovskaya, Zolotareva, 2021).

According to the Higher Education Policy Institute’s (HEPI)4 2022 report, the USA and the UK lead the way in attracting international students. The report presents data showing that the USA has maintained its lead since 2017. “Soft power” tools are used to attract the most ambitious applicants to the leading universities, as it is the applicants with high aspirations who become political leaders and promoters of new values in their countries (perhaps some countries use hidden mechanisms to promote such graduates to political leadership). According to the report, in 2022, the USA educated 67 world leaders; followed by the UK – 55; France – 31; Russia – 10; and Australia – 9. In 2020, the USA educated 62 world leaders; the UK – 57; France – 35; and Russia – 10. Russia ranks fourth in educating political leaders, while the USA has moved up in the rankings since 2020 (+5).

We supplement the information with Project Atlas data5, which are collected by an international research group and record indicators of student mobility, academic migration and internationalization of higher education. According to the data for 2022, there are 351,127 foreign students studying in Russia, mainly from the following countries: Kazakhstan – 62,358 people; China – 39,939 people; Uzbekistan – 39,825 people; Turkmenistan – 36,773 people; Tajikistan – 20,251 people; India – 18,536 people; Ukraine – 11,123 people; Egypt – 10,535 people; Belarus – 9,769 people; Azerbaijan – 7,987 people. The most common areas of training: medicine – 72,029 people; engineering – 75,542 people; economics and management – 60,695 people; pedagogy – 30,849 people; humanities – 19,021 people. In the global ranking compiled by Project Atlas, Russia ranks sixth in the number of international students, after the USA – 948,519; the UK – 633,915; Canada – 552,580; France – 364,756; and Australia – 363,859.

Unfortunately, it is difficult to get a complete picture of educational migration of young compatriots to Russia based on open data. Some conclusions can be drawn by interpreting the following information:

– information on the entry of foreign citizens into the Russian Federation by purpose of visit, when selecting the purpose “education” in the EMISS constructor (Tab. 1) ;

– data of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation based on the monitoring of the implementation of the state program to assist voluntary resettlement of compatriots living abroad to the Russian Federation (Tab. 2) ;

– information provided by universities in reports on contingent and educational migration; data collection is coordinated by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation and the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation.

Thus, international statistical data show that interest in Russian education on the market of educational services is high. At the same time, the Russian statistical data are insufficient to formulate reasonable conclusions. We try to identify the main resources for attracting and adapting foreign applicants, relying, first, on the concept of E. Lee, which allows analyzing push and pull factors causing migration; second, on the concept of L.L. Rybakovskii, systematizing social processes affecting migration, since the analysis of factors and conditions is the basis for the development of resources to support foreign students; third, on the concept of “soft power” and, finally, on the research of students’ adaptation strategies to the host community.

Table 1. Data on entry of foreign citizens to the Russian Federation (purpose of visit – education), people

Institutional resources of attraction and adaptation of educational migrants in foreign universities

The increased interest in the problems of adaptation of foreign students is evidenced by rising volume of publications on ScienceDirect, the international database (The keywords used for the search were “adaptation of international students”; accessed at: ; for the period 2000–2022, the database contains 57,007 papers (Fig.).

Research on the adaptation of foreign students is international in nature. An example of international cooperation project implementation is the publication by S.V. Ryazantsev and co-authors, which analyzes the Japanese model of attracting foreign students. Based on focus group data, the authors note that Japan uses selective migration, focusing on attracting applicants from ethnoculturally close Asian countries (Ryazantsev et al., 2020), that is, they use a model of work on adaptation of educational migrants, which is the most convenient for implementation.

Adaptation issues are widely covered in review articles. H. Xiaoying, S. Baharom, L. Sunjing (Xiaoying et al., 2023) study the influence of the level of cultural intelligence on the academic adaptation of international students. A.V. Sarmiento and co-authors (Sarmiento et al., 2019) systematized articles published between 2012 and the first semester of 2017 and outlined 45 theoretical frameworks for the study of international students’ adaptation.

A. Yerken, L.A. Nguyen Luu (Yerken, Nguyen Luu, 2022) studied the adaptation of applicants from post-Soviet countries. The study, conducted using qualitative interviews, reveals that students from Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Moldova consider Hungary as a host community only for the period of education, as their ultimate objective is pursuing a career in other Western countries.

In general, foreign studies pay more attention to psychological aspects of adaptation than to resources and technologies for working with international students (Matera, Catania, 2021; Zeng et al., 2022; et al.).

Dynamics of publication counts in the ScienceDirect international database regarding foreign student adaptation issues

Source: own compilation.

It is not possible to trace the dynamics of research publications concerning institutional resources for attracting international students, as the discourse is not unified. For example, a large number of works were published in the USA after September 11, 2001. For example, G. Borjas speaks about rethinking the positive results and risks of educational migration (Borjas, 2002). Indeed, on the one hand, it is possible to achieve positive objectives – international students become familiar with institutions and culture, which leads to the promotion of the host community’s values. G. Borjas notes that the most talented young people from other countries remain in the USA. On the other hand, foreign students can undermine the security of the country, and their poor knowledge of English leads to a decrease in the quality of education in general.

M. Rosenzweig (Rosenzweig, 2006) identifies two models to explain the international mobility of students to developed countries. First, migration occurs due to the lack of educational institutions in the home country (which is not relevant for Russia). In this case, students migrate to acquire human capital and return home to take advantage of educational investments in their home country. Second, student visa migration may be a means of entering and staying in another country to avoid low benefit from education in the country of origin. The desire for higher income is the main factor driving student migration.

The USA and the UK occupy the highest positions in the world rankings in terms of the number of leading universities. The main institutional resource in this case is the high standard of living of the host community and recognition of high quality of education. For the USA and the UK, the relevant issue is not the issue of increasing the number of international students and finding resources, but the introduction of competitive selection tools (including language exams) and visa restrictions on entry (Chen et al., 2023; Kato et al., 2013). Several studies have attempted to answer whether the influx of international undergraduate and graduate students restricts opportunities for young people in the USA or whether high fees paid by international students subsidize the education of local youth (Borjas, 2007; Shih, 2017).

Resources for attracting international students and increasing academic mobility are necessary if the university is not among the top leading universities or if it is planned to maintain its place in the international ranking. High competition in the market of educational services promotes the monitoring of technologies for entering the market of educational services of universities, the academic reputation of which is just being formed. For example, H. French notes that Chinese universities attract the best professors from among compatriots to work in little-known universities (French, 2005). Working with the best specialists among the compatriots educated abroad, giving them the opportunity to manage equipped laboratories, select talented students, and receive high salaries is one of the effective measures to improve the reputation of a university and the university’s place in international rankings. However, participation in international rankings does not always increase the university’s recognition, as digital inequality is fixed worldwide (Rostovskaya et al., 2023). On the example of the study conducted in Australia (Tran et al., 2022), we make a conclusion that the attraction of educational migrants can be built as a business model, but even in this case state support is necessary, as this issue is included in the system of international relations.

Thus, we reveal that the general trends in the study of institutional resources for attracting foreign migrants are not formed in the scientific discourse, and the issues that are raised in different countries depend entirely on the national security strategy.

In this regard, it is necessary to review the resources used by Russian universities to consider the institutional resources that contribute to the formation of pull factors that allow foreign applicants, including compatriots, making a decision on educational migration to Russia and effectively adapt to the host community.

Activities of Russian universities aimed at attracting and adapting educational migrants

We used a method of qualitative analysis of documents – self-inspection reports of universities with the largest number of international students to achieve the research goal. The sample included self-inspection reports of 10 universities for 2022, which, according to information published on the website of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation6, are leaders in the admission of foreign students: Federal State Autonomous Educational Institution of Higher Education “Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia named after Patrice Lumumba”7 (hereinafter – RUDN University); Federal State Autonomous Educational Institution of Higher Education National Research University Higher School of Economics8 (hereinafter – HSE University); Federal State Autonomous Educational Institution of Higher Education Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University9

(hereinafter – SPbPU); Federal State Autonomous Educational Institution of Higher Education Kazan (Volga region) Federal University10 (hereinafter – KFU); Federal State Autonomous Educational Institution of Higher Education Ural Federal University named after the First President of Russia B.N. Yeltsin11 (hereinafter – UrFU); Private Educational Institution of Higher Education Omsk Humanitarian Academy12; and self-inspection reports for 2021: Federal State Educational Institution of Higher Professional Education Lomonosov Moscow State University13 (hereinafter – MSU); Federal State Budgetary Educational Institution of Higher Professional Education Saint-Petersburg State University14 (hereinafter – SPbSU); Federal State Autonomous Educational Institution of Higher Education I.M. Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University of the Ministry of Healthcare of the Russian Federation (Sechenovskiy University)15; Non-State Private Educational Institution of Higher Professional Education Moscow University for Industry and Finance Sinergy16.

In today’s complex geopolitical conditions, the global media reports that Russian universities are excluded from the Bologna system17. In general, this will not affect the quality of Russian education, which is traditionally high, but may affect the representation of Russian universities in international rankings such as QS World University Ranking (QS), Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU), Times Higher Education World University Rankings (THE). The decrease in the representation of Russian universities in the ratings may become a push factor and contribute to their lower recognition on the educational services market, so it is necessary to examine what strategies and resources are used by the universities to overcome the current risks.

In the course of qualitative analysis of the documents, the tasks in hand included outlining strategies and organizing the resources of Russian universities for working with international students, which can be perceived as pull factors; determining whether there are special tools for working with international students from CIS countries and/ or compatriots. Further we place the universities in the order corresponding to the order of their mentioning in the information report of the Ministry of Education of Russia, excluding the data on OmHA, Sechenovskiy University and Synergy University, because the structure of the reports of these universities is compressed, which does not allow analyzing the strategies of work with foreign applicants and students, they state in general terms that the tasks of inclusion of the universities in the world educational space are realized, but there is no actual data on the resources used to solve the task, so other methods of research of university resources are needed to formulate valid conclusions.

RUDN University is traditionally very popular among foreign applicants. According to the selfinspection report, the university maintains multilingualism in education; conducts activities to strengthen academic prestige both at the federal and regional levels; the Career Center launched a Telegram-channel for international students, which provides information on employment of foreign students in Russia; develops scholarship programs, network educational programs; implements employment projects for international students and graduates with the companies “Yandex” (YanGo) and “Novostal-M”. The report contains a paragraph on the enrollment of international students and states that the indicator of the implementation of the programs “Priority–2030” and “Program of complex development of the Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia – 2025” is “at least 10,000 RUDN students annually from 160+ countries”. As a result, the enrollment plans are fulfilled, the number of students from Asia, CIS and Baltic countries, Europe, Middle East and North Africa is growing. Positive results in RUDN University have been achieved not only due to initiative projects of the university management, but also in the course of implementation of the state assignment, due to active cooperation with the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation, setting quota places for foreign applicants, etc. The university also uses the resources formed after meetings with ambassadors and representatives of diplomatic missions, engages recruitment agencies in the admission campaign, uses the platforms of the centers of Russian education abroad, which RUDN University organizes on the basis of foreign partner educational organizations, partner universities, etc. In 2022 new platforms were opened in Tunisia, Indonesia, Morocco, Serbia. RUDN University participates in the international Olympiad movement, exhibition and presentation activities, using both offline and online formats.

Besides, scientific joint activities are carried out, as they have become the basis for increasing the number of foreign graduate students.

Kazan Federal University has developed a list of measures to provide quotas for foreign citizens to study at Russian universities on bachelor’s, specialist’s and master’s degree programs; it also organizes the international MagistriUm Olympiad, in which bachelors from 22 countries took part in 2022, and 13 foreign citizens became winners. The work is underway to attract foreigners not only to master’s programs, but also to postgraduate programs (100 people, including 89 people from non-CIS countries and 11 from CIS countries). The report states: “KFU holds stable leading positions among Russian universities in terms of export of educational services, ranks second in terms of absolute number of foreign students in the main educational programs among universities of the Russian Federation and is one of the top three universities in Russia, identified by foreign applicants as a priority using electronic systems of Federal Agency for the Commonwealth of Independent States Affairs, Compatriots Living Abroad, and International Humanitarian Cooperation (hereinafter – Rossotrudnichestvo) within the framework of the admission campaign. According to the indicator “Share of international students” in 2020, KFU entered the top 200 of the international QS ranking (198th place). KFU is also one of the leaders among Russian academic centers in attracting foreign scientists and is one of the top five in terms of interaction of Russian scientific organizations and universities with foreign scientists”18. Active position of the university rector in supporting international meetings, sending employees to foreign countries, interaction with Rossotrudnichestvo, participation in nine international educational exhibitions in Uzbekistan,

Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Egypt in 2022, preparatory program in Egypt, network training programs in Turkiye and Iran, use of the “STUDERUS” educational platform developed in KFU, organization of advanced training in the form of internships for 20 prorectors on scientific work and innovations of higher education institutions of Uzbekistan, creation of a network of KFU branches abroad in priority regions and countries such as Uzbekistan, Egypt, Kazakhstan, on demanded specialties and areas of training. All these are the pull factors for foreign applicants to KFU. An interesting project is the organization of unique events by the Russia – Islamic World Strategic Vision Group, which has been headed by the President of the Republic of Tatarstan R.N. Minnikhanov since 2014. The development of this project makes it possible to consider religion as a pull factor for studying at KFU, and the university is also developing a multicultural environment.

At SPbPU, a BIG PhD competition was held for foreign citizens in 2022. Representatives of SPbPU are members of the Presidium of the Organizing Committee of the International Olympiad “Open Doors” on the track of master’s and postgraduate studies, subject, methodological and expert commissions. The report states that the target regions for international student enrollment in 2022 were Ibero-America, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and the CIS countries. International students gain unique competencies at the university. For example, for eight years, SPbPU has been training students from Turkey in the field of nuclear energy in cooperation with Rosatom State Corporation and Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant, together with the IAEA. A new international master’s degree program “Emergency preparedness and response” was opened with financial support from Rosatom. SPbPU holds Summer and Winter Schools to attract international students, and implements international professional development programs and other activities.

MSU is the Russian university most recognized in the global market of educational services, which is due to the history, reputation of the university, quality of education confirmed by all international ratings. The reputation of MSU’s foreign branches in Astana, Tashkent, Baku, Dushanbe, Yerevan, Koper (Slovenia) is also high. The distance learning experience made it possible for MSU to quickly transform the technology of attracting applicants (“Since 2020, under the COVID-19 pandemic, MSU’s admissions campaign has been conducted entirely in a distance format. This format allows building an effective campaign to attract foreign students and to enroll them in the educational programs of Moscow University”). As a result, MSU is implementing a combined admission model, which has increased the accessibility of postgraduate programs for foreign citizens. In 2021, enrollment was held for 14 programs implemented jointly with international partners from the world’s leading universities, as well as with the participation of corporate partners, enrollment is underway for foreign language programs, dual and more diploma programs.

HSE University provides educational counselors and employment assistance for international students. There is a system of international student recruiting, Olympiad competitions, short-term training programs, a center for international online promotion (creation of Russian and English-language content for social networks, portals – VK, Baidu, QQ, WeChat, Zhihu, etc.), the “Year at HSE University” admission model. The project of academic lyceum classes of HSE University was launched in Tashkent, an agreement was reached on the formation of the Higher School of Economics of Kyrgyzstan on the basis of the Training Center of the Ministry of Finance of Kyrgyzstan, an info-hub on visa and migration support for foreign students ivisa. hse.ru was developed, foreign students are provided with comfortable accommodation in the dormitory.

UrFU is working on establishing friendly relations not only with partner universities, but also with enterprises of Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Mongolia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Egypt, Sri Lanka, and China. The university takes part in international exhibitions, with the participation of the university in 2022 Russian language centers were opened in Egypt, as well as in China on the basis of Hengxing University.

SPbSU includes information about international accreditation of educational programs in the diploma to attract foreign applicants and increase the demand for graduates in the international labor market; implements “two diploma” programs, including the “Russian language and Russian culture in the aspect of Russian as a foreign language” program within the area of study 45.04.02 “Linguistics” with Fergana State University (Uzbekistan); SPbSU organizes the work of educational program councils, whose members include consuls and ambassadors of foreign countries, offers foreign citizens to participate in the SPbSU Schoolchildren Olympiad, offers 27 basic educational programs that are fully implemented in a foreign language, develops the Club of foreign students of SPbSU, etc. In the report of SPbSU, unlike the reports of other universities, there is a reference to the category of compatriots: “In 2021, an open competition for foreign citizens within the quota of places allocated for the education of foreign citizens, stateless persons and compatriots permanently residing abroad at the expense of budgetary allocations of the federal budget of the Russian Federation was organized”19.

Let us systematize the information on institutional resources of universities to increase the number of foreign applicants (Tab. 3).

Table 3. Institutional resources for attracting educational migrants to universities

Resources	Results
External resources
Legal framework	Regulating the quota places for foreign applicants •    Quota places program for international applicants Regulating border crossing by international students •    Visa and migration support for foreign students Regulating the implementation of educational programs in the Russian Federation •    Network educational programs, programs of two or more diplomas
Finances	•    State programs to support Russian universities (“Priority 2030”) •    Programs of Rossotrudnichestvo •    Grants and other sources
Information resources	•    News about the main trends in the development of higher education in the world •    News agenda of institutional actors (Ministry of Science and Higher Education, Rossotrudnichestvo, etc.).
Digital technology	•    International and Russian educational platforms •    Distance education •    Online meetings (business, educational, scientific)
International educational ratings	•    Strengthening academic prestige •    Saving money on promoting a news agenda about the achievements of Russian education
Internal resources
Human capital assets of university	•    Participation of teachers and students in the international Olympiad movement •    Expansion of the network of foreign partners •    Organization of professional development, internships for foreign students, teachers, specialists working in the higher education system •    Opening of educational programs in English and other languages •    Organization of Summer and Winter Schools for students •    Adaptation programs for students (assigning academic advisors to international students; opening clubs for international students, providing a multicultural environment, etc.).
Financial management strategy	•    International accreditation of educational programs •    Scholarship programs for international students •    Work with recruiting agencies •    Secondment of employees to foreign countries •    Targeting •    Organization of international Olympiads •    Scholarship programs for talented youth and young teachers •    Recruitment of leading specialists for teaching activities
Information resources	•    Promotion of the news agenda about the achievements of the university •    Publication of information in several languages on the official website of the university •    Publications in social networks, including those popular in other countries
Building partnerships (stakeholders)	Rossotrudnichestvo: •    Participation in meetings and conferences with ambassadors and representatives of diplomatic missions •    Organizing or participating in the opening of Russian language centers •    Support in establishing a network of branches abroad in priority regions and countries •    Participation in international educational exhibitions Employers: •    Assistance to foreign students in finding employment in the Russian Federation •    Scholarship programs Other educational organizations: •    Consortia, etc.
Digital technology	•    Distance education •    Online meetings (business, educational, scientific)
Source: own compilation.

Conclusion

The legal framework has a predominant impact on the attraction of educational migrants. According to Federal Law 99-FZ, dated May 24, 1999 “On the state policy of the Russian Federation concerning compatriots living abroad”, compatriots may enroll in Russian educational organizations on equal rights with Russian citizens. In this case, admission to bachelor’s and specialist programs is carried out on the basis of the results of entrance examinations and/or the results of the Unified State Examination both for places with the payment of tuition fees and for places financed from federal budget allocations.

Foreign citizens may enroll for places financed from budgetary allocations of the federal budget, in accordance with the Government Decree 2150, dated December 18, 2020 “On establishing a quota for the education of foreign citizens and stateless persons in the Russian Federation”20. The following quotas for education in the Russian Federation for foreign citizens and stateless persons, including compatriots living abroad, are established: in 2021 – not exceeding 18 thousand people; in 2022 – 23 thousand people; starting from 2023 – 30 thousand people.

It is indicative that only one surveyed report of educational institutions uses the concept of “compatriots”, hence, no specific work with this category of foreign applicants is carried out. When it comes to the optimization of migration policy in relation to compatriots, the Concept of legal regulation of migration scientific and educational policy in the context of export of Russian education through to 2030 is of interest. It represents a system of principles, approaches and priorities in the sphere of legal regulation of social relations arising in the process of realization of constitutional and legal foundations of migration educational policy (Skorobogatova, 2021). However, the main principles of the concept are not reflected in the work of universities.

The analysis of the documents shows that the main resources of the leading universities are human capital; development of communication at different levels in the process of interaction of universities with the Ministry of Education, diplomatic missions, partner universities, educational organizations of secondary general education, employers, etc.); information resources that promote the university brand, including through social networks (VK, Baidu, QQ, WeChat, Zhihu, etc.); finance.

The effectiveness of attracting educational migrants depends on the existence of a comprehensive strategy of the university, where the cost structure includes the costs of both attracting leading professors and retaining internal human capital – from leading professors to specialists in youth policy. Financing a university is a complex mechanism, but investments in attracting educational migrants pay off, as the cost of education for foreign students is higher than for Russian citizens. When attracting the attention of foreign applicants, establishing long-term cooperation, universities form exclusive offers, which may become the reason for choosing a particular institution for admission (religion, multicultural environment, employment of foreign students, dual degree programs, etc.). Planning specific work with compatriots enables universities to work in the context of Russia’s demographic development.

20 Available at: (accessed: September 20, 2023).