Interfax publishes ranking of Russia's best universities for public administration training

Interfax Group has published its third annual ranking of Russian universities with state and municipal management programs as part of the National Ranking of Universities (NRU) project.

The ranking of 50 Russian universities was again topped by the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (Ranepa). The top five universities for training future leaders also included the Higher School of Economics in second place, followed by the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO) in third, the Plekhanov Russian University of Economics in fourth and Lomonosov Moscow State University in fifth.

"The quality of professional training and the relevance of research in the field of management remain the most important problems for the system of administration of the country, regions and cities. The results of our ranking help universities to position themselves as a high-quality educational platform for training highly-skilled professionals and government agencies to efficiently select a talent pool," Interfax Group Executive Director Alexey Gorshkov said, adding that the ranking also helps to develop universities' brands, and raise the profile of administrative professions and public service.

The NRU top 20 universities in the category of state and municipal management also include the Financial University of the Russian Government, Southwestern State University, RUDN University, St. Petersburg State University, Baikal State University, the State University of Management, Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University, North Caucasus Federal University, Moscow City University, Russian State University for the Humanities, Belgorod State University, Kuban State University, Southern Federal University, Volgograd State University and Siberian Federal University.

Northern (Arctic) Federal University, Transbaikal State University, North-Eastern Federal University and Perm National Research Polytechnic University entered the top-50 ranking for the first time.

"The main difference of the presented rankings is not only the quality assessment of the digital transition of educational programs, but also a quantitative evaluation related to the inclusion of masters programs in the ranking method," Gorshkov said, adding that the core of university assessment - the research performance of the teaching staff of state and municipal management programs - remained unchanged.

Universities were assessed according to five indicators: number of post secondary educational programs in state and municipal management; number of publications by university authors in journals indexed by international scientometrics on the subject of Public Administration in the period of 2018-2020; number of publications by university authors in journals listed by the Higher Attestation Commission on the subject of Government and Law in the period of 2018-2020; average citation of university authors' articles in the field of social sciences published in journals listed by the Higher Attestation Commission in the period of 2018-2020; and number of students who graduated with distinction in 2020.

A complete version of the results of the ranking is available at academia.interfax.ru.

Interfax Group launched the National Ranking of Universities project in 2010 in order to develop new mechanisms and procedures for independent evaluation of Russian institutions of higher learning and their educational programs, increase the competitiveness of Russia's education system, research and technology entrepreneurship, and develop federal and regional universities.

Interfax is Russia's largest non-governmental information group, having created the advanced information and analytical systems SPARK, SCAN, RuData, Marker, and X-Compliance that help businesses manage risks and work with data efficiently. The group includes one of the most well-known and most cited Russian news agencies in the world, Interfax, whose clients include leading media outlets, government agencies, major corporations and banks in Russia and globally.