There has been talk of increasing the period of graduate study in Russia from 3 to four years. This proposal has been justified in part due to the fact that some disciplines, such as the technical and natural sciences require mandatory experimental validation of the theoretical results.
From Inside Higher Ed:
The idea behind that proposal is that it should significantly improve the quality of dissertations and the quality of academic training. This proposal is consistent with international practice, where dissertations can take 4-5-6 years. More importantly, the current situation really needs to be improved – drop-outs are high and the average level of research associated with doctoral theses is quite low. However, many people believe that increasing program length, by itself, is unlikely to change anything, and that the problem is not too little time, but extremely poor financial support for such studies and work. Indeed, the basic post-graduate scholarship –currently about $50 a month – doesn’t allow students to focus entirely on research since they must seek some part-time or even full-time job to support themselves. The sad result is that most of PhD students devote too little attention and effort to their dissertation. Only 26% of graduate students finally submit their thesis and the quality (generally) is rather weak. Additionally, since PhD degrees are prestigious, there is a large demand for degree holders and this status is easily bought and sold. So the PhD degree does not necessarily reflect strong training or a sophisticated academic qualification anymore (This situation is most disastrous in the social sciences).
The Russian government also recently announced increases in graduate scholarships starting this September. This comes at the cost of reducing the number of graduate students.
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