University environment and its influence on the development of the student's personality: actualization of the problem from the standpoint of the philosophical and competence approaches

Abstract

The article focuses on the problem of how university environment influences student’s personality development from the standpoint of philosophical-competent approach. Validated that this problem is both large, complex and extremely socially significant on university, local and global levels. It needs a permanent solution, because every new generation of students is different from the previous generation. Each new generation faces new challenges while stepping to their professional career. The difference between these challenges was not as significant and not that much socially implying in the past. Nowaday challenges, that should be responded in adequacy with the high-graduate professional, are clear and could be even pattern-breaking not only in 5-year education period, but even between year-to-year graduates. The ideological competence as the ability of specialists with higher education is determined corresponding to their own outlook to the social statuses and roles that they embrace and carry out. Attention is drawn to the fact that the world-view competence is the determining factor in general competence. The fact that modern civilization accelerates into the global ecology crisis proves the lack of ideological competence of post-graduate individuals. After all, they are the main subject of life transformation backed with intelligence and the most advanced achievements of science and technical progress. Proposed to consider the global human competence as it’s endangered and synergistic ability to halt the global ecological crisis and ensure sustainable civilization development. Explained that global competence is possible only if it’s subjects will be ruled by values that have a positive correlation with principles of sustainable development. Promotion of such values should be facilitated in university environment where individuals considered as future life changers are getting their degrees. Attention is paid on the importance of basic principles of ideological competence development (morality and social responsibility). Proved that it can be achieved only if conditions of an academically virtuous and democratic university environment are met. Substantiated that one of the effective methods to create such conditions should be launching effective governance mechanisms to university activities management. The emphasis is put on authoritarianism that blocks personal freedom in many domestic institutions, resulting in the lack of personal responsibility skills. It’s impossible to develop a responsible citizen without proper freedom conditions, only slave can be an option. For the adequate understanding of complexity and diversity of the extraordinary social impact of university environment on student’s identity under the conditions of social and global challenges author performed a critic analysis of national higher education insitution’s ability to deal with this issue through the prism of the following contradictions: 1) Technical and social development or science and technical progress and social evolution; 2) Competence criteria on local levels and global competence requirements; 3) The current crisis of classic universities and global challenges of technogenic civilization that graduates should deal with; 4) National university status devaluation in Ukraine and the urgent need to boost national competitiveness; 5) Virtualization and education process distancing from university environment and ever-increasing requirements to humanity of graduates. In the process of critical analysis through the prism of contradictions described above the challenges on global, social, and university levels were identified, and individuals with higher education should respond to these with competence. Suggested to use these challenges as a peculiar matrix to make the assessment for each given higher education institution to prepare such individuals and determine their prospective ability to further development and existence.