On February 7, the Verkhovna Rada adopted the draft law on mobilization in the first reading. It contains changes regarding the categories of persons who cannot be called up, in particular in the field of education and science. Why did certain details of the draft law cause sharp criticism and should be revised before the second reading?
Volodymyr Artemchuk, deputy chairman of the Council of Young Scientists of Ukraine at the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, deputy director for scientific and organizational work of the Institute of Modeling Problems in Energy, named after Volodymyr Artemchuk, told about this on the air of Public Radio. G.E. Pukhova of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Doctor of Technical Sciences.
“According to the draft law on mobilization, which was adopted in the first reading, it is assumed that two categories from the educational sphere will not be subject to military service during mobilization for a special period. These are the acquirers of professional, vocational-technical and specialist pre-higher and higher education, who study on a full-time or dual basis and acquire a level of education that is higher than the previously acquired one, in accordance with the sequence determined by the law of Ukraine, except for graduate students who acquire an education level of funds of individuals and legal entities under the terms of the contract, as well as doctorates and persons enrolled in internships. The second category is scientific and scientific-pedagogical workers of institutions of higher and professional pre-higher education in scientific institutions, organizations that have a scientific degree, and so on.
Thus, among the new categories proposed to be added are pedagogical workers of professional pre-higher education. But, at the same time, it is proposed to remove post-graduate contract students, which is a frankly discriminatory rule, which, I hope, will be changed by amendments during the second reading. At least, many deputies have now registered such amendments, and the corresponding petition on the president’s website gained the required number of votes in a few days. Therefore, we hope that the deputies will still understand that scientists can make a significant contribution, in particular to the development of technologies for the protection of our country,” says Artemchuk.
It is important for Ukraine to take care of the scientific field and the arrival of new young specialists. This affects, in particular, the defense of our state.
“If we look at the report of the Academy of Sciences and the official data of the State Statistics Service, we will see that since 2011 the number of young scientists in Ukraine has been constantly decreasing. For example, in the Academy of Sciences, it decreased by almost three times. As for postgraduate students, which we are talking about, there are a lot of them, as of January 1, 2023, according to the State Statistics Service, their number is even smaller than it was in 2009-2011. And without an influx of young people, science in Ukraine is doomed to extinction. As recent years have shown, they do not want to give or sell us high-tech modern weapons, so it is extremely necessary to develop our research, since any modern engineering solutions are based on numerous fundamental and applied research. Thus, the preservation and development of Ukraine’s scientific potential can be attributed to the issue of national security,” says the Deputy Chairman of the Council of Young Scientists of Ukraine at the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.
It is believed that a large number of men returned to education after the start of the full-scale invasion to avoid conscription. It can correspond to reality only partially.
“I would divide this issue into two points. There are people who get a certain educational level repeatedly. Here, obviously, there is a certain scope for abuse, and it is large, although it is quite difficult to evaluate it. The draft law proposes to remove this loophole and leave protection against mobilization only for those who obtain a level higher than the existing one. If we talk about the numbers, which we like to call, that the number of graduate students has tripled, or something else, then official statistics say that it is not even close. You can also look at the distribution of the number of male and female graduate students, traditionally there are two graduate students for one female graduate student. But such a proportion is observed both in the category under 25 years old and in the category after 60 years old. Therefore, there is no reason to talk about a mass phenomenon of evasion,” says Artemchuk.
Material from the website “Public Radio”
