Russia has for a long time been justly proud of its educational system. For all of its many faults, one thing positive the Soviet Union did manage to do was bring near-universal literacy to its population and establish a very high level of general education. This was true even despite the copious amounts of time spent learning the history of the CPSU and memorizing its latest pronouncements.

Today´s Russian educational system, sadly, is beset by two scourges: lack of funding and deep-seated corruption. This latter is especially true in the case of subjects prospective students and their families be lead to lucrative careers, like economics, linguistics and law. (It is not so in such departments as philosophy, sociology and so forth, an education in the humanities not being seen as capable of demanding a high salary on the labor market.)

Professors and administrators in such university departments are famous for the extensive bribes they demand for both ensuring a student´s enrollment and, then, making sure their grades are of a sufficiently high caliber. This practice - which has as its root the woefully law salaries that are doled out to employees at state institutions, who earn nowhere near enough to support themselves, let alone raise a family - has the effect of undermining the reputation of the university system and the viability of students who graduate from it. These students may have educational backgrounds that look good on a resume, but are actually woefully unprepared for the tasks the real world will demand of them.

There has been a lot of talk about improving conditions for teachers, and some work has still been done. However, the money paid out to them is still pitifully low and hardly an incentive to refrain from greasing their palms. Education really is the foundation of any modern society, and the government should do everything in its power to nurture it.