Russian Federation

Nonformal education is represented by a network of more than 7,600 institutions of different types with 6,300,000 students engaged in technical work, tourism, biology, sports, music, art, and other activities. The economic and political reforms of the late 1980s to 1990s have freed the extracurricular programs of the ideological Communist influence, but have also brought about considerable reduction of financing of nonformal education. The Octobrist, Young Pioneer, and Komsomol (Young Communist League) organizations, which used to engage young people in all kinds of extracurricular activities, were disbanded in 1991 and have not been adequately replaced. The numbers of facilities and program participants have significantly decreased. Cultural and political education offerings for adults, which were widely spread in the USSR, have largely become the things of the past. The remaining institutions are learning to survive under new socioeconomic conditions.

Due to the long-established tradition and high value of all-rounded education in Russia, parents regard additional education for their children as a priority and are willing to pay for it. Former Young Pioneer palaces and houses, which have been transformed into children centers, Young Naturalist stations, technical stations, youth clubs, and vacation camps continue to provide both educational and recreational activities. Part-time music, art, and sports schools are reorganized on new principles. Emerging types of institutions include multifunctional children centers, teenage clubs, ecological and health centers, schools of folk culture and crafts, religion-related schools, as well as institutions of Noble Young Ladies trying to revive pre-revolutionary values. Aerobic classes and foreign language courses are very popular with teenagers and adults. In big cities, especially Moscow and St. Petersburg, numerous courses prepare young people for study abroad. Another widely spread form of nonformal education, which is a major expense for families with teenage children, is private tuition mostly used to coach secondary school students for higher education entrance exams.

The plans for the improvement of nonformal education were aimed at the development of its legal basis, extension of the network, and introduction of new organizational forms and services. Adult education, which was largely ignored in the late 1980s to 1990s, also needed improvement. In 1997 the heads of the CIS governments signed an "Agreement on Operation in the Field of Disseminating Knowledge and Education for Adults" and established an Interstate Committee for the realization of the program. It was aimed at solving both educational and social problems (unemployment, and training of specialists for new areas of knowledge).