Assessing the impact of factors on the education infrastructure in the arctic zone of the Northern macroregion

Given the orientation of Russia’s state policy toward the development of its Arctic zone, one of the major directions of socio-economic development in these territories is to modernize educational facilities and form a system of qualified personnel. Having calculated the rate of changes in the indicators, we reveal negative trends in the development of school and vocational education infrastructure in the Arctic zone of the Northern microregion; this confirms the relevance of the study. The education infrastructure, regarding its components, is understood as a set of infrastructure facilities of preschool, school and vocational education, as well as their staffing with qualified specialists. The aim of the research is to identify and assess the impact of a set of factors on the change in the education infrastructure in the Arctic zone of the Northern macroregion. We study the object of research at the mesoregional taxonomic level of spatial-territorial Arctic systems in relation to specific local communities; this increases the objectivity of our findings. The geography of the study is based on an institutional approach and includes Arctic mesoregions of the Arkhangelsk Oblast, Nenets Autonomous Okrug and the Komi Republic, which together form the Arctic zone of the Northern macroregion. We put forward our own methodological approach to assessing the impact of factors on social infrastructure in the Arctic zone of the Northern microregion. The approach contains a system of indicators reflecting changes in the education infrastructure and economic, demographic, spatial-territorial and socio-labor factors affecting it over the past fourteen years. We use methods of comparative analysis, systematization and grouping, statistical and correlation-regression analysis. The results of the study allow us to conclude that the influence of the factors on the education infrastructure in the Arctic zone of the Northern macroregion is differentiated depending on the nature and pace of development of the territories under consideration, state policy implemented in these territories, and other factors.