Development trends of the network of general educational organizations in the Vologda oblast

Education is a key sphere of functioning of the society, and the most important source of its permanent progressive development. It is the level of the quality of education that motivates the development of science and culture, intelligence and spirituality, the development of the economy, civil society and other fundamental social benefits. And they, in turn, ensure the sovereignty, power and independence of the state and its international standing in the world community. Today the society is going through a stage of profound fundamental transformations, which lead to the fact that education, knowledge, and intelligence become the dominating resource for the development of both the new economy and society as a whole. However, the system of school education is characterized by the reshaping of general education institutions network that has been going over the last ten years. The aim of the study is to identify trends and problems of the development of the school system in the Vologda Oblast. The article presents an analysis of the system of school education in the Vologda Oblast. The author’s research revealed that over the review period there had been a decreasing trend in the population base in most of the administrative-territorial entities of the Vologda Oblast. The population decline in the regions mainly occurs due to the demographic decline and migration processes. This resulted in a decrease in the number of students in general education institutions, and consequently, in a decrease in the number of schools in the region. The paper concluded that the implementation of the activities provided by the programs had made it possible to contribute to the development of school education, but there are still many problems that require modernization of the development of school education in the Vologda Oblast. Those issues might be resolved with the help of full range of measures, such as the development of technical and social infrastructure of rural areas, the optimization of small secondary schools, the implementation of a distance education system in sparsely populated areas, the growth of school vehicle fleet meant to transport students, the modernization of the material and technical resources of educational institutions. The following research methods were used when writing this article: statistical method, method of comparison, and method of analysis. The materials can be used by researchers, postgraduates, college undergraduates, as well as by all those interested in the development of the school system.