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The transition to a new technological order will lead to the emergence of completely new large markets in the next 10-20 years that will offer consumers advanced technological solutions and innovative products and services (Kulbyatskaya, 2017; Zhang & Niederman, 2017). Accordingly, the Fourth Industrial Revolution will soon require new quality and personnel qualifications, as well as staff retraining (Zhang & Niederman, 2017). Therefore, today the focus is being placed on STEM education in Russia and around the world. To sustain competition in the scientific and technological sphere, the Russian Federation should introduce engineering education and at the same time enhance the professional development of graduates. To accomplish this task, the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation decided to introduce changes in the educational process. The active introduction of STEM education in educational institutions can be one of the ways to increase the interest of engineering students in learning and scientific activities (Sabirova et al., 2020).
STEM is an acronym used to describe scientific and technical areas in education and production. Thus, S stands for science, T – technology, E – engineering, M – mathematics (Grigoriev & Kurnosenko, 2018). The concept refers to the features of the didactics reflected in a combination of interdisciplinary practice-oriented approaches to the study of natural sciences and mathematical disciplines (Noor et al., 2021). Even though in modern science there are different approaches to STEM education, researchers agree that it is an innovative educational phenomenon that implies a new process of acquisition and assimilation of knowledge related to scientific, technological, engineering, and mathematical fields. Its purpose is to prepare graduates for professional activities, in particular, for performing professional tasks and solving problems through the acquisition of scientific thinking skills and the development of STEM competencies.
Today STEM education is a priority in many countries. In Russia, the trend is getting widespread within the framework of the National Technological Initiative (NTI) with the support of the Council for Economic Modernization and Innovative Development, the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, the Institute of Pedagogy and Psychology of Education, as well as the representatives of leading high-tech Russian and foreign companies and large business associations of Russia. Due to the versatility and complexity of the phenomenon, it takes a certain amount of time to solve the problems associated with the introduction of new curricula in educational institutions, as well as with the creation of conditions for STEM projects implementation. A significant advantage of STEM education is the interdisciplinary approach to teaching, which makes it possible to acquire knowledge from various sciences and use them in the study of other disciplines of the humanities, sciences or technology (Shukshina et al., 2021).
The key problems of introducing STEM education in the top countries of the world and the prospects for its development in Russia are highlighted in foreign (Kanadlı, 2019; Martin-Hansen, 2018) and Russian research (Frolov, 2010; Kulbyatskaya, 2017; Rudskoy et al., 2017b). Separate studies are devoted to STEM education with the elements of problem-based learning aimed at the improvement of student research skills (Duda et al., 2019; Grigoriev & Kurnosenko, 2018; Hadiati et al., 2019). The relevance of STEM education in terms of employment opportunities in the context of high-tech industries development is considered by both Russian scientists (Repin, 2017; Vodolazhskaya et al., 2018) and foreign researchers and practitioners (Kim & Keyhani, 2019; Jamaludin & Hung, 2017). The studies on the involvement of women in STEM careers, their appropriate training, employment and the problems that arise during these processes are also relevant from the perspective of gender parity (Mansfield et al., 2014; Pelch, 2018).