Features of assessing of the universities’ digitalization: factor analysis

This research is aimed at identifying barriers and potential growth points in the field of digital transformation of higher education as an element of a regional innovation system. The authors of the research developed an approach to the implementation of factor analysis to assess the digitalization level of universities, which allows to provide support for management decisions. The proposed approach was approved on the example of the Russian leading universities-participants of «5-100-2020» Program in 2019. The information base of the research is the information provided by universities on the official pages. The assessment of indicators’ impact on assessment of university digitalization was realized for 3 groups of universities: leaders, followers and outsiders, also for aggregate of analyzed universities on average. As a result, it was revealed that such factors as the number of: electronic resources and publications in Web of Science, Scopus and RSCI systems; online courses in foreign language; Youtube subscribers have the greatest impact. This fact can be explained by: the decline in the volume of scientific activity of university professors; lack of an adequate number of high-quality video lectures and developed foreign courses. Factors such as the number of followers on vk.com and Instagram; the existence of platforms with an electronic timetable of lectures have not practically impact on the formation of assessment of universities’ digitalization. This is due to the attractiveness of the material provided by universities in social networks and the sophistication of basic digital services. To conclusion, it can be recommended for higher educational institutions to pay special attention to stimulating the growth of R&D indicators and maintain the achieved level of other digitalization indicators.