Education as an image of the future

It is shown that the development of civilization is based on the system of education, which should be ahead of the immediate needs of the economy and society. The article presents an analysis of the extent to which this thesis is confirmed by the practice of reforming Russian education over the past 20-30 years. It is noted that in Russia there is no clearly expressed orientation of changes in the education system to overcome the growing challenges – the transition of developed countries to a high-tech economy and the growing global comprehensive competition between countries. It is proved that the reason for this state of affairs is the lack of a deep systematic analysis of the real state of our educational system and, accordingly, serious pedagogical research, on which the overdue reforms could be based. The conclusion is made about the expediency of returning the functions of advanced planning and organization of research in promising areas of development of secondary and higher education to the Russian Academy of Education.