Overcoming the Academic Failure of Students as a Priority of Educational Policy: The Case of Russia

Introduction. One of the priorities of the modern educational policy of Russia is to ensure the academic success of young students – schoolchildren and university students. However, the realization of this goal is in conflict with other objectives of educational policy and factors in the development of Russian higher education, including initiatives in the field of school education. Traditionally, academic failure is interpreted as an individual’s phenomenon related to the inefficiency of pedagogical approaches and technologies. However, in fact, the social scale and context of the problem make it necessary to consider it as an institutional phenomenon, the prerequisites of which are formed at the level of pre-university education. The purpose of the article is to interpret the problem of academic failure of students in the context of educational policy. Materials and Methods. The theoretical basis for studying the relationship between educational policy and academic failure of young students is the theory of inequality in education and the concept of the policy of “choosing winners”. The empirical basis of the article is the results of a study carried out using the following methods: analysis of documents (scientific publications, regulatory documents, statistical and monitoring research data), semi-formalized expert interviews with representatives of educational organizations in Yekaterinburg and the Sverdlovsk Region (n = 30 people). Results. Government initiatives aimed at reducing inequality in education are shown as an institutional context for overcoming academic failure of young students, covering pre-university education. The contradictions of such state initiatives in Russian education as the Unified State Examination, a project to support schools with low learning outcomes and/or schools operating in difficult social conditions, and the Academic Olympics movement are revealed. It is proved that the problems of implementing institutional initiatives in school education serve as prerequisites for the formation of academic failure of university students. Discussion and Conclusion. The practical significance of the research results is seen in the justification of the directions for improving government initiatives and projects to support students to overcome their academic failure. Further analysis of the latent contradictions of the Russian education system in the context of the introduction of institutional measures to overcome the academic failure of schoolchildren and university students seems promising.