Demographic education in modern Russia: mismatch between the needs and opportunities

Negative trends in major demographic processes, aggravated by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, require not only an active demographic policy, but also thoughtful and well-grounded management decisions. This raises the requirements for the qualifications of employees in the field of science, education and management personnel in terms of their understanding of complex and multifactor demographic processes. Consequently, the need for training and retraining of demographers is also increasing. The purpose of the work is to assess the current state of demographic education in Russia and the possibilities of its development. The article presents an overview of foreign and national educational and scientific practice in the field of demographic education. We find that the “Demography” field is included in the enlarged group “3. Social sciences, business and law”; therefore, most educational institutions implement educational programs in the “Sociology” field; more often these are master’s degree programs. Scientific institutions focus on collaborating with educational institutions and pursue an educational and scientific trajectory (for example, the USA); they can also work autonomously by responding to the needs of the state and society (France, Germany). We also review Russian practice of implementing the educational process under the program “Demography”. We find out that only three universities conduct educational activities under this program. However, the scientific and educational potential for training demographers, taking into account “non-core” universities and academic research organizations, is available in the capital and in the regions. Nevertheless, the presence of laboratories specializing in demographic research proves the relevance of demographic knowledge in various regions of Russia. The analysis of departments’ teaching staff confirms their high educational and scientific potential. An overview of the work of scientific institutions and departments at universities indicates that vigorous scientific and research activity in the “Demography” field is being conducted in Russia. The analysis shows that in modern Russia, the issues of standardization of this area of work and education have not yet been fully worked out. We substantiate a system of successive stages for development of an educational standard in the “Demography” field and approval of the “Demographer” professional standard.