PhD, Professor D.N. Platonov¹
Dr.Hab., Professor A.N. Tambovskiy²
PhD, Associate Professor Е.V. Krivoruchenko¹
L.L. Platonova^1
1Ammosov North-Eastern Federal University, Yakutsk
²Moscow State Academy of Physical Culture, Malakhovka, Moscow region

Keywords: regional system, specialist education, physical culture and sports sector, problem, Sakha Republic (Yakutia), education establishment, graduate, specialist.

Background. The high priority given to modern physical culture and sports the world over is explained by their growing social and political effects and importance. The mass popular physical culture and sports advancement process success and further accomplishments of Russian athletes in domestic and global events are only possible if driven by an efficient and determined labour of highly knowledgeable and skilful sport specialists trained at the relevant physical education and sports establishments.

As of 2016, the proportion of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) population engaged in active physical culture and sports was reported at about 18% versus 40-50% typical for the leading sporting nations of the world, and it shows that the Republic still has a long way to go in the mass sporting culture development process. The need for further efforts to advance the republican physical culture and sports is also obvious in the context of the negative trends in the Yakut young population physical development and fitness as verified by tests and reports [1, 2].

In view of the negative trends in the Republican population physical development and sporting standards, the Republican authorities have developed and adopted the relevant regulatory provisions for the local policies in the physical culture and sports sector, including the Physical Culture and Sports Development Strategy of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) for the Period of 2009-2020 viewed as the key policy document. The Strategy has specified the key fields, ways and methods for the policies to secure a sustainable and fast progress of the Republican physical culture and sports sector with full acknowledgment of the fact that “presently the further progress of the Republican physical culture and sports sector is only possible if based on an integrated and theoretically well-grounded system approach” [1].

In the efforts to advance the Republican physical culture and sports projects based on the above approach, the relevant Republican agencies have taken initiatives both in the theoretical and practical domains [2]. Many analysts have mentioned that for the initiatives to be successful they need to be designed with a special emphasis on the regional specifics of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) including the geographical, climatic, transport and many other aspects [1, 2, 3]. The Strategy also specifies a variety of factors of the inhibiting effect on progress of the Republican physical culture and sports that need to be addressed on an effective and timely basis.

A top priority in these initiatives are to be given to the sector staffing policies, and we believe that presently the progress in this domain is inhibited by the following key factors:

• Shortage of physical education teachers and coaches; still low professional competency and skills of physical education specialists, instructors and coaches; and still inefficient professional specialist education and advancement system; and
• Shortage of the professional human resource for physical rehabilitation of health-deficient and disabled people [1].

We believe that a high priority will be given to the human resource development initiatives; and the challenges of the system need to be addressed by the relevant continuous education and advancement system to staff the Republican physical culture and sports sector with highly professional and competent specialists, with this human resource development policy being ranked among the key objectives of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) physical culture and sports sector policies. It may be pertinent to mention that an attempt to address the problem of the Republican physical education system reform was made in a thesis by M.D. Gulyaev who also highlighted the problem of the Republican physical culture and sports sector design and management problem as one more drawback of the regional policies [2] that is still of inhibiting effect on the above regional physical education system reform and development initiatives.

Objective of the study was to analyse the key components of the regional continuous education and advancement system.

Methods and structure of the study. As far as the subject analysing, summarizing, logics and formalisation aspects are concerned, we fully realise the complicated interconnections of different components of the system under analysis and, being limited by the study format that gives no way to describe and analyse in detail the whole structure, content of its every element and interrelation of the latter, we made an emphasis herein on the key components of the system only.

We believe that a top priority in the analysis should be made on a trainee as the pivotal system-forming element to consider different stages of the human resource element formation stages up to the highest (academic) one – for the reason that no education system may be designed unless duly fuelled with the relevant human resource.

Study results and discussion. As things now stand, the Republic operates a chain of educational establishments designed to provide the relevant staged competences to the trainees. The chain may be described starting from the local preschool education establishments, general education schools (with the relevant sport classes), Children’s and Youth Sport Schools (CYSS), Children’s and Youth Olympic Reserve Sport Schools (CYORSS) and universities. However, their systemic interrelations need to be analysed using a set of the relevant characteristics that has not been formed and applied to the Yakutia system as yet.

Furthermore, it is an educator who is considered the other key element of the regional continuous physical education system for the education process quality largely depends on his/her professional competences, knowledge, skills, enthusiasm and teaching mastery. In addition to the commonly known credentials of a good educator, due priority should be given, in our opinion, to his/her analytical qualities i.e. the ability to logically and purposefully apply the available information and practical provisions and find the critically important albeit deficient information for success.

The educational provisions may be classified into the following few groups. The first, material and technical provisioning group basically implies the physical provisions (assets and equipment) pivotal for the education process. The second, financial provisioning group includes the motivational provisions for the educator i.e. the labour remuneration for educator and payments for the trainee. The third, psychological provisioning group refers to the psychological conditions for the individual resources of the educator and trainee being mobilised and employed in full to develop their creative resources, open up the career opportunities and facilitate the individual careers. And the fourth group may be described as the regional provisioning one which is actually the most important for the purposes of the study as it refers, among other things, to traditional lifestyles of the Yakutia population, local languages, cultures, physiological aspects and climatic conditions.

As to the other key components of the Republican continuous physical education system, mentioned first are the alumni self-development module covering the individual progress from the secondary special to the higher specialist education including the post-graduate stage and even the professional specialist advanced training stage in the Republican physical culture and sports sector. A variety of different advanced education forms and systems needs to be put in place to support the specialist self-development process. Benefits of the specialist self-development process being combined with and supported by versatile advanced training systems are due to the specialist knowledge and practical skills being better and faster customisable to the specific requirements of the corporate employers (regardless of their ownership forms) in the sector – both to the already employed and potentially employable specialists. 

Having analysed the existing Republican continuous physical education and sports specialist training system, we should mention that it is still in need of further development on a systemic basis i.e. its design is to be governed by the relevant system-building criteria, as follows: (a) continuous process with the general and professional education stages being consistent; (b) due objectivity of information on the education process on the whole and its every stage in particular; (c) consistency of the process management decisions to ensure their impacts on each component of the system and its operational outcomes being effective; (d) the system is to be designed on an integrated basis as required by the relevant logics and content. And it is important that the relevant education process efficiency rating criteria are duly harmonised and consistent enough along the whole chain of the educational establishments contributing to the process. At this juncture, the existing system is apparently inconsistent in this aspect.

Conclusion. Based on the above overview, we would conclude that presently all the key components of the modern continuous physical education specialist training system are available in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) albeit both the system on the whole and its components in particular are in need of further improvements. The system progress assurance issue deserves a special attention from the decision-makers and researchers engaged in or contributing to the Republican physical education and sport specialist training process.

References

1. Gulyaev M.D. Modernizatsiya upravleniya sistemoy razvitiya fizicheskoy kultury i sporta v novykh sotsialno-ekonomicheskikh usloviyakh na regionalnom urovne (na primere Respubliki Sakha (Yakutiya)) [Regional modernization of management system of physical culture and sports development in new socio-economic conditions (case study of Sakha Republic (Yakutia)]. Moscow: Sovetskiy sport publ., 2012, 352 p.
2. Platonov D.N. Strategiya razvitiya regionalnoy sistemy nepreryvnogo fizkulturnogo obrazovaniya v Respublike Sakha (Yakutiya) [Regional continuous physical education system development strategy in application to Sakha Republic (Yakutia)]. Yakutsk: NEFU publ., 2015, 251 p.

Corresponding author: fizkult@teoriya.ru

Abstract

The study considers the key components of the regional continuous education of the physical education and sports specialists in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia). It is emphasized that a special attention is to be given to the regional geographic, climatic, transportation and other specifics of the Republic for the progress of the local physical culture and sport sector projects. Issues of the continuous education of the local physical education and sports specialists should be addressed on a systemic basis i.e. every specific aspect is to be addressed as required by the system including: continuity of general and professional education; objectivity of the information on the education process and its stages; consistency of the system management policies, decisions and practices to control every system component, function and effect; and the consistency of the system design with its every element having certain structure and content and logically interconnected with the others. It is also important that the applied education establishment performance efficiency rating criteria are duly harmonized for the whole chain of establishments within the system.