This article explores the relationship between adolescents’ attitudes toward the use of game mechanics in education and their academic motivation and transversal educational outcomes, including critical thinking, creativity, communication, collaboration (4Cs), and digital literacy. The study involved 312 adolescents aged 13–15 from 10 regions of Russia, all attending “IT-Cube” centers for digital education. Questionnaires and interactive tests (4C and DigLit) were used to assess perceptions of gamification, motivation, and skills.

The findings indicate that frequent use of gamification mechanics, such as "tasks and quests" and "reward systems," positively correlates with students’ intrinsic motivation and engagement. However, some mechanics, particularly those involving competitive elements, may induce anxiety in high-achieving students. The frequency of gamification mechanics application shows a weak positive relationship with intrinsic motivation but has no significant effect on digital literacy or 4C skills. Gender differences were observed, with female students reporting higher anxiety related to gamification mechanics, though no differences were found in overall engagement.

The article emphasizes the need to adapt gamification mechanics to educational goals, individual student characteristics, and motivational profiles.

The importance of student engagement in the learning process is widely recognized during the last years. Engagement has shown positive relationships with various crucial aspects of learning both in traditional and online learning environments. However, there exists a research gap pertaining to engagement in non-formal learning contexts.

This paper investigates the students' engagement in STEM learning and its relationship with contextual factors, employing the example of out-of-school activities and engagement in a mobile game designed to teach programming skills.

The results show that students' engagement in STEM learning in extracurricular education is positively correlated with online engagement measured through mobile game activity. Furthermore, student engagement in the mobile game demonstrates a significant relationship with the behavioral and emotional components of engagement, but not with the cognitive component. Additionally, it is revealed that the perception of the tasks offered serves as a significant contextual factor influencing engagement in both out-of-school and mobile game contexts. Moreover, peer communication exhibits a significant relationship with engagement in out-of-school classes, but not in the single-player mobile game. These findings highlight the potential of collaborative and multiplayer scenarios for edutainment games.

This study enriches engagement theory by applying it to the realm of non-formal education and edutainment. The findings hold particular relevance in light of ongoing initiatives aimed at engaging children and adolescents in STEM learning, as well as fostering their interest in science and technology, and may contribute to the development of more effective policies and programs in the field of STEM education.

In the context of the massification of higher education, first-generation students (those whose parents do not hold a higher education degree) face specific barriers to accessing university due to their distinct needs, prior experiences, and career expectations. This puts them at risk in terms of educational success, underscoring the importance of research aimed at better understanding the characteristics of this student population. The purpose of this article is to identify the typical profile of Russian first-generation university students and to examine their admission strategies as well as the features of their educational experience. The study is based on a survey data collected from Russian university students within the framework of the Monitoring of Education Markets and Organizations project (N = 9,969). Contrary to international research findings, the results indicate that Russian first-generation students do not differ from their peers whose parents have higher education degrees across most of the examined characteristics. Although differences in admission strategies and educational experiences are statistically significant, they cannot be considered substantial due to the small effect sizes. This can be explained by the specifics of the Russian context, where higher education is widely perceived as a social norm, tuition-free university education remains highly accessible, and a standardized admissions system may mitigate initial inequality effects. At the same time, subsequent research should pay special attention to differentiated analyses of the trajectories, attitudes, and educational experiences of first-generation students enrolled in selective versus non-selective universities. Such an approach would provide a more nuanced picture—one that captures not only general indicators of higher education accessibility for traditionally underrepresented groups, but also potential barriers to accessing the most prestigious segment of higher education.

This paper is one of the first attempts to assess the prevalence and specifics of bullying in extracurricular education.  The authors hypothesized that 1) bullying occurs in extracurricular education, with prevalence rates comparable to those of school bullying; 2) the risk of bullying is higher in children's groups with the expectation of high educational results than in regular children's groups. The sample was formed from students of 17 large extracurricular education organizations in one Russian city. The study involved 2969 respondents from 8 to 15 years of age, the average age of which was 11.3 years, 33% were boys. The prevalence rates of bullying were found to be similar to those recorded at school (30%), thus accepting hypothesis 1. Verbal and social types of bullying are more distinct, and physical bullying is less so. The prevalence of bullying is higher in children's groups where higher educational outcomes are expected, which allows us to accept hypothesis 2.

Russia's movement towards education sovereignty and the intent to create competitive graduate programs necessitate the modernization of student selection procedures. Admissions to master's programs in Pedagogy, among the most large-scale in the country, require special attention as teacher training directly influences the overall quality of national education. International experience could serve as a source of ideas for admission requirements' transformation. The present article contains a complex analysis of master's admission practices at universities leading in Education and Training, as determined by the QS Subject Ranking. Eleven requirements for admission are recognized, described, and divided into three groups: omnipresent, frequent, and rare. The formal side of the requirements is evaluated through content analysis, their meaning – through inductive thematic analysis. Five assessment criteria are distinguished: academic, motivational, communicative, professional, and ideological. The prevalence of the first three criteria, with the ideological component gaining prominence, is noted, while Russian universities continue to focus on assessing the applicants' subject and pedagogical knowledge.

Article presents result of the study of the segment of English-language master's programs in data science implemented in BRICS countries. Characteristics of 75 programs were analyzed: title; specialization; form, format and duration of study; type of degree awarded; tuition fees; curriculum content; professions of graduates; features of the educational institutions implementing the programs. Descriptive and correlation analysis, nonparametric statistical texts and clustering were used as data research methods. It was revealed that the titles of master's programs most often include terms "data", "analytics", "business" and "science", a significant share of programs are implemented at universities and award Master of Science degree, typically suppose offline teaching and last for two years. Statistically significant differences in tuition fees are observed across countries and across programs with different study durations. Cluster analysis revealed four groups of master's programs with similar characteristics, each with specific features: (1) rather expensive programs, offered at lower-ranking universities, that award MS degrees; (2) the most expensive programs, offered primarily at non-university institutions, that award MS degrees, with a significant share of programs specialized in certain subject area; (3) inexpensive programs, offered at higher-ranking universities, with a significant share of programs specialized in certain subject area or data science method; and (4) inexpensive programs, offered primarily at lower-ranking universities, with a significant share of programs specialized in certain subject area.

This article focuses on analyzing the narratives of Russian parents of children 3-12 years old about their children's involvement in extracurricular systematic sports and physical activity (SPSA). In addition, it examines the barriers and agents of involvement in systematic physical activity classes. The empirical material is 4 focus groups with 36 parents aged 27-50 years living in Moscow, St. Petersburg or Tambov (13 fathers and 23 mothers). The results of the focus groups are analyzed by means of thematic analysis and compared with foreign literature on the topic and sociological explanations of children's involvement in SPSA, which the authors construct at the beginning of the article. According to the results of the study, it was found out that according to parents' perceptions there are three groups of children from the point of view of their involvement in systematic extracurricular SPSA activities: not involved, weakly involved and strongly involved. The list of barriers to the involvement of young children in systematic additional SPSA classes includes both a wide list of subjective and objective factors, and there are no universal ones, i.e. shared by all parents.  Parents identify the family as the main agent of involvement in SPSA. The research findings in relation to involvement can be explained by existential approaches in sociology and generally reflect foreign studies, although there is a slight difference in the rationales for the low involvement that Russian parents see in the age of the child. With regard to barriers and agents of involvement, all sociological justifications proved to be relevant, and the empirical results obtained correlate with foreign studies. Thus, no striking differences between Russian parents in terms of their rationalizations of children's involvement in SPSA and foreign parents were revealed.

The article focuses on professional education in the biographies of young people aged 18-35. Based on 66 in-depth interviews about growing up, interpretation of generations, sustainability and initiative, conclusions are drawn about differences in the narrative about the place and meaning of  professional education in the lives of young people of two types of employment (wage employment and self-employment).

By combining methods of biographical analysis and open coding, the results were obtained confirming the growing unpredictability of the career trajectories of young people. The biographies of self-employed youth are characterized by the category of “disappointment” when building a career trajectory. At the same time, for specialists working for hire, the attitude towards the educational stage in biographies was revealed as a “background” for more significant activities during this period. The data show a narrative about the higher agency of self-employed youth in choosing an educational vector and a greater emphasis on the connection with dynastic professional history for the narratives of employees working for hire. Both categories of workers continue their education after receiving a diploma, but for the self-employed, its source is autodidactics, and for employees working for hire, it is the place of work. As for the meaning of education, the self-employed point to the importance of acquiring professional skills, while employees working for hire understand education as a pass to adulthood.

Worldwide, high-stakes entrance examinations are subject to rigorous requirements: they must be as objective, reliable, and fair as possible. This entails that the processes of their development, administration, and scoring are carefully controlled and standardized to eliminate any possibility of bias. In Kazakhstan, university admission is based on the results of the state entrance examination—the Unified National Testing (UNT). The aim of this study is to investigate the validity of the UNT results in Kazakhstan, focusing on the mathematics component. Particular attention is given to two sources of validity evidence:  based on internal test structure and based on relationship with other variables, specifically criteria of students’ subsequent academic success in higher education. The theoretical framework for this research is grounded in S. Messick’s validity theory. A series of validation studies were conducted in accordance with the methodological standards set forth by American Educational Research Association, American Psychological Association and National Council on Measurement in Education, employing classical test theory, modern test theory approaches, and statistical analyses including hierarchical linear modeling. The findings indicate that the UNT mathematics exam demonstrates strong psychometric properties. Furthermore, both the overall UNT score across five subjects and the mathematics effectively predict students’ future academic performance at university. The quality of the statistical models used and the proportion of variance explained in students’ first-semester grades are largely consistent with results reported by researchers from other countries, including Russia and the United States.