What’s New in Online Learning: Interview with Olga Sokhneva, Head of Higher Education at Netology
We asked Olga Sokhneva, Head of Higher Education at Netology, as part of the podcast How is this possible? platform “Russia – Land of Opportunities” to talk about trends in online education, what skills will be useful in the future, how IT giants cooperate with schools and universities.
What do you need to learn today in order not to relearn in 10-15 years?
The world is changing very quickly. It is difficult to imagine what professions will be in 10-15 years, when the current first-graders will graduate. Already now we see that programming and analytics skills are becoming a basic specialty, in many universities they are given for all faculties. In my opinion, project skills are also important – the ability to design a project, assemble a team, interact with people and, as a result, get some kind of result that you are going for. This competence is number one, but so far little attention has been paid to it. And also soft skills have not been canceled.
One of the main skills that will always be useful is the ability to learn. And online education is just preparing such a challenge for us: to agree with ourselves in order to cope with procrastination and get down to business. What tips and life hacks can help?
It seems to me that life hacks that can be used in online education are the same tips that are useful for remote work. Let’s remember the picture when a person sits on the beach with a laptop under a palm tree and works. You might think: “My God, how good it is for him, how cool it is to work on the beach under a palm tree!”. In fact, very few people can really work effectively at sea.
Our online magistracy is a place where we teach people not only skills and knowledge, but also the ability to study remotely, as well as work online in the future. We are preparing full-fledged remote workers who can work in any conditions and not depend on the place. Speaking specifically about skills, I would single out the following: the first is the ability to build your own schedule and move within the schedule that you set yourself. Because otherwise you will be tired, exhausted and you yourself will not understand why in the afternoon you have already run out of strength. I faced such a problem and until I put lunch on my schedule myself, they tried to fill this slot with meetings all the time. Now – no, everyone has already understood that lunch is sacred.
It is also important to prioritize tasks for remote work and distance learning when you understand what important tasks you want to do today and in a week. Otherwise, you run the risk of getting bogged down in a routine or often being distracted by trifles.
Big IT companies are now investing in human resources and educational projects in order to get future specialists from current students and even schoolchildren. How do companies collaborate with schools and universities?
Not only IT companies, but also many other organizations have realized that in order to obtain qualified specialists, they need to be involved in the educational process. Companies began to actively cooperate with universities, schools and educational programs. This year, at Netology, we launched two higher education programs: one with the Higher School of Economics in digital product management, the second with the RANEPA in digital entrepreneurship. And next year we plan to launch 7 more online master’s programs.
In the magistracy, we pay great attention to a practice-oriented approach. We have educators – people from business who manage projects and market-leading products. They use case studies of real companies in their training, which helps to better absorb new material. After the end of the program, teachers invite these students for internships, and then they take the best into their team.
We see great interest from companies in our educational programs. When we started to create an online master’s program in Digital Entrepreneurship, I thought that entrepreneurs would doubt the quality of such education. However, already now people have come to a hybrid format and appreciate the guys who have the skill of distance learning and are able to work remotely.
Does the online format affect the cost of education?
In online education, there is an asynchronous format when people study the subject themselves, watch video lectures, take tests, pass an exam and receive a certificate. In this case, the cost of education can be reduced due to the fact that lectures are recorded once, and then they can be sold as much as you like.
But there is another learning format that we adhere to in Netology – the synchronous format, implemented as an inverted class. We give the lecture part through a video previously recorded in microformat for 7-10 minutes. The student receives knowledge and tests himself. After that, he comes to the webinar not just to listen to a new topic, but to ask his questions and discuss what he learned on his own from the video lesson. In this format, online learning cannot be cheaper, because it requires no less work to create an educational portal.
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