S.M. Akhmetov, professor, Dr.Hab.

Federal public budgetary educational institution of higher education "Kuban state university of physical education, sport and tourism", Krasnodar, Russia

Key words: teaching and training process, research activity, sports work, training of volunteers.

This year Krasnodar institute of physical culture celebrates its 45^th anniversary since its foundation on the basis of the resolution of the Council of Ministers of the USSR No. 32 of December 31, 1969. In 1993 it was transformed into Kuban state academy of physical education, and in 2003 – into Kuban state university of physical education, sport and tourism (KSUPhEST). Being one of the leaders of the Russian branch "Physical culture and sport" in the context of training of highly skilled professional personnel, the university is rightly considered as a leading higher professional educational institution in the Southern federal district. During all the years of its existence the faculty, students, postgraduate students and staff of the university have succeeded in the improvement of the training process, research, sports work and other trends of professional activity. The names of its graduates are known far outside Kuban and the Russian Federation, including glorified Olympians: Andrey Lavrov (handball), brothers Anatoly and Sergey Beloglazov (free-style wrestling), Evgeny Lipeev (modern pentathlon), Oleg Khodkov, Igor Chumak, Eduard Koksharov, Dmitry Filippov (handball), Shamil’ Sabirov (boxing), Irina Karavaeva and Alexander Moskalenko (trampolining), Lyudmila Chernova (track and field athletics), Murat Kardanov (Greco-Roman wrestling).

During the five years that have passed since its 40^th anniversary, the university has been developing dynamically. So we can look forward with optimism.

The university administration pays considerable attention to improvement of the training process of highly skilled specialists in physical culture and sport. They are being trained in seven integrated groups of specialities (specializations), including twenty five educational programs of higher and three programs of secondary professional education, as well as programs for postgraduate and additional education.

The optimum structure of training in physical culture and sport has been developed at the university for the last five years. Vocational training at all levels (secondary professional, higher professional education – bachelor’s course, specialist programme, master’s course, training of elite staff on the basis of postgraduate and doctoral courses) and additional education (on the basis of professional development and personnel retraining faculty) are being implemented in the university. Students are being trained in twenty sports specialization groups: including sixty five sports, among them thirty eight are Olympic ones. Curricula for secondary professional and higher education on the specialities "Physical Education", "Adaptive Physical Culture", "Tourism" are being integrated in the university. Graduates of Humanitarian college and the Olympic reserve school included in the organizational structure of the university, have an opportunity to be trained according to the reduced programs of higher education, combining educational and sports activities.

More than 200 PhDs and doctors of science, 9 honoured workers of physical culture of Russia; 16 honoured workers of higher education; 11 honoured trainers of the USSR, Russia; 2 masters of sports of the international class; 32 masters of sports of the USSR, Russia; 8 high achievers of physical culture and sport are involved in the training process.

High quality training of specialists in the field of physical culture and sport is provided by modern educational facilities and resources of the university, including over 100 lecture rooms, 17 computer classes, academic building for track and field athletics, sports complex with two pools and six gyms, rowing and sailing bases, library with a reading room with wireless Internet connection (Wi-Fi), assembly hall, dining room, two halls of residence, recreation center in the Betta settlement of the resort town of Gelendzhik on the Black Sea coast of Krasnodar Krai. In addition, the university includes in its structure pre-university training center, training center for foreign citizens, water fitness center "Garmoniya", fitness center and language training center.

The target training of physical education and sport staff on the basis of contracts with executive authorities of subjects of the Southern and the North Caucasian federal districts is being carried out in the university. Annually up to 15% of the volume of the state task for professional staff training is allocated for the university entrants according to target contracts. Here the individual job-placement procedure for the university graduates is functioning. The center of promotion of graduate employment is operating effectively. The annual graduation of specialists in physical culture and sport is more than seven hundred people. The university graduates are in demand on the regional and federal labor markets.

There is a scientific library in the university structure which is now one of the largest in the system of higher education institutions of physical culture and sport of the Russian Federation. Wireless Wi-fi is available in the reading room. New modern equipment and computers are installed for the access to the e-library resources and remote databases in it.  At the moment the full text database of works of the university scientists’ papers totals more than one thousand records.

It is important for the university management system to improve the quality of the monitoring system of the educational process, which provides effective management of the processes defining the university strategic development. The main part of the monitoring system is the organizational and methodical support and different types of academic performance rating by means of large-scale computer testing of students based on intra-university test bases.

To create the unified system of assessment of department activity and improvement of its efficiency the rating evaluation of the activity of the university teaching staff was introduced for reasonable estimation of their results.

One of the main objectives of the university is to improve teachers’ professional level. Courses intended for teachers to improve and master new competences on different programs are annually conducted at the faculty of professional development and retraining. The courses are as follows: "Modern approaches to implementation of educational programs for bachelors in humanities", "Innovations in education and pedagogics", "Features of the organization of physical education classes for students attributed to special medical group due to health", "Modern approaches to the organization of the educational process on medicobiological disciplines in universities of physical culture ".

Formation of the faculty is a matter of the university staff policy. One of its main goals is the purposeful training of scientific and pedagogical staff based on graduates of postgraduate courses and master’s course. Development of the positive motivation to their career development in young teachers, improvement of their professional skill level, training of staff reserve at departments are the main directions of the developed university staff policy for the next five years.

Responding to the requests of the labor market, the university also plans to expand the list of profiles for master’s training, including sports management and operation of sports facilities.

The research work of the university staff is essential for the enhancement of the training process in the university. Specialists of the Research Institute of Problems of Physical Culture and Sport, including in its structure 5 scientific laboratories, the innovative incubator, the theoretical and methodical center of complex maintenance of athletes’ training and the department of scientific and technical support, are of great importance. The research activity of the faculty is being carried out according to four priority directions of the research activity subordinated to the Ministry of sports of the Russian Federation and universities:

• Formation of physical culture and healthy lifestyle;

• Scientific grounds of elite sport;

• Organizational, legal, resource and information support in the sphere of physical culture and sport;

• Theoretical and methodical backgrounds of development and improvement of the training system, professional development and retraining of staff.

The scholar schools in various branches of knowledge being successfully developed are as follows:

• Pedagogical sciences (13.00.00): "Scientific and pedagogical backgrounds of physical culture and sports activity".

• Psychological sciences (19.00.00): "General psychology, personality psychology".

• Economic sciences (08.00.00): "Enhancement of physical culture and sports services".

• Culturology (24.00.00): "Scientific and culturological problems of physical culture and sport".

The university faculty and the staff of the Research Institute of Problems of Physical Culture and Sport are involved in the following developments: scientific projects on grants of the Russian humanitarian scientific fund, the Russian fund of fundamental researches; the scientific themes which are included in the plan of subjects of the scientific research and advanced development of the Ministry of Sport of the Russian Federation; the international program "Health and Behavior of Schoolchildren" being implemented under the auspices of the World Health Organization; scientific projects for the scientific and technical program "Health of the Population of Kuban"; the municipal program "Physical Training and Health of Children and Teenagers".

On the basis of the association agreement with the Federal State Unitary Enterprise YUG SPORT the university specialists are developing two main research areas: training of the highly skilled staff providing operation of the recreational equipment and specialized gyms, and participation in the work of biomechanical, psychological and physiological laboratories of the Center, being most important during the theoretical and methodical support of the long-term training of elite athletes.

According to the state contract between the Federal State Budgetary Institution Center of Sports Training of Russian National Teams and the university staff – members of the complex research group (CRG) are working at the theoretical and methodological support of the training of athletes of national trampolining and sailing sports teams of Russia. University scientists also take part in the integrated theoretical and methodological support for national teams of the Russian Federation in taekwondo, canoeing, beach volleyball and some adaptive sports.

University specialists are engaged in the medico-pedagogical control of the training process of national teams of Krasnodar Krai and the Republic of Adygea in cycling and road racing. By request of the Ministry of physical culture and sport of Krasnodar Krai the theoretical and methodological support of the training of the combined teams of Krasnodar Krai in 27 sports was organized. Annually more than 2000 people are examined in the scientific research institute laboratories of the university. The condition of over 600 elite athletes is repeatedly examined, 250 of whom are members of national teams of Russia and combined teams of Krasnodar Krai. Consultations for trainers of Krasnodar and Krasnodar Krai in swimming, scuba diving, the women’s volleyball team Dynamo, the football teams "Kuban", "Krasnodar" and the women’s football team "Kubanochka" are given on a regular basis.

In 2013 the university started implementing the international grant of the Council of Europe Trans-European mobility scheme for university studies "Tempus" on the subject "NETOUR": a project of European and Russian universities that aims at boosting Russia's competitiveness as a tourism destination". 16 educational institutions and organizations act as partners in the grant, including 8 Russian and 8 foreign ones (Spain, Finland, France, Ireland, the Great Britain).

In 2012 the technology incubator was established at the scientific research institute (SRI). Its main activity was the development and assistance in the implementation of perspective scientific projects of young scientists of the university. They often take prizes and are awarded with grants for the projects at such competitions as: "U.M.N.I.K.", "Young businessman of Russia", "The IQ of the year Award", "Russian Startup Tour", "Kulibin", "Zvorykinsky project", "Competition BITS", "Competition of Russian innovations" etc. Now the active work on the preparation for the development of a small innovative enterprise on the basis of KSUPhEST within the framework of the federal law No. 217 is being conducted by the staff of the scientific research institute.

The Dissertation Advisory Committee D 311.009.01 for doctoral and Ph.D. theses in: 13.00.04 – "Theory and methodology of physical training, sports training, recreational and adaptive physical culture" (pedagogical and psychological sciences); 03.03.01 – "Physiology" (biological sciences) functions at the higher educational institution.

Elite staff in six specialties is being trained at postgraduate courses in the university. Within its activity young teachers, post-graduate students and the students who are members of the Council of young scientists and students' scientific society are actively introduced into the research.

Scientists of the university have got good results in the researches on the major developed scientific directions which were used in training of elite athletes of national teams of the Russian Federation and Krasnodar Krai. The directions were as follows:

- researches were conducted within the formation of the methodology of anticipatory identification of the state of overtraining in elite cyclic athletes, which enhances greatly the management of the training process and promotes the growth of sports achievements;

- the results obtained in the course of the work on the problem of identification of physiological mechanisms of the asymmetries formation  and their role for ensuring of effective activity and forecasting in elite sport help test the athletes’ technical skill level and functional condition in view of the profile of intersemispherical asymmetry. This lays the basis for the prerequisites for additional model characteristics at various stages of sports qualification, as well as prerequisites of scientific justification of the technology of the individualization of the process of long-term sports training and the definition of the degree of adequacy of pedagogical impacts on the motor sphere of the engaged athletes.

- morphofunctional mechanisms of formation of spatial-temporal properties of athlete’s  body have been investigated taking into account adaptation to specific muscular activity. The findings are used in the training process in sports acrobatics, rhythmic gymnastics, taekwondo, badminton, table tennis, power lifting, and also in the work with athletes with musculoskeletal disorders;

- the neurophysiological mechanisms of organization of voluntary movements and motor skills formation in a person in health and disease are studied using computer stabilography, interferential electromyography and quantitative electroencephalography. The findings help define overtraining degree, predict the possibility of receiving sports injuries; estimate motor and mental functions in those engaged in such sports, as sports acrobatics, table tennis, power lifting, including  athletes with musculoskeletal disorders;

- the program and analytical complex for the analysis and optimization of the athletes’ energy balance and food status was developed. It can be used to monitor eating behavior and food preferences, assess nutrition safety and model special purpose products;

- the issues of psychological follow-up of the process of training of athletes of the sports reserve as a way to increase their competitiveness are being developed, which contributes to the objective assessment of mental processes, properties of psychophysiological states, functional asymmetry; the systematic monitoring of athletes’ mental readiness for training load and performance at competitions, their psychotic reactions to competitive and training loads; planning of actions for athletes’ psychic rehabilitation and the increase of their stress resistance;

- new modern research methods have been developed and mastered which contribute to development of the methodologies of assessment of motion technique in different sports; formation of technologies of managing the process of technical training of athletes; monitoring of the efficiency of rehabilitation actions at post-traumatic and pathological disorders of the musculoskeletal system; improvement of the psychofunctional state, health, development of physical qualities of engaged persons; reducing the restoration period after strenuous physical activity; diagnostics and correction of their psychoemotional state.

In recent years specialists of the university have got more than 40 patents for their inventions and useful models.

Results of the researches of the university teachers and scientists can be found in publications of various levels and contents (monographs, textbooks and manuals, scientific papers), and they are represented at conferences of various ranks from regional to international ones, some of which are held at the premises of the university.

The theoretical and methodical journal "Fizicheskaya kultura, sport – nauka i praktika”(Physical Education, Sport — Science and Practice) is published at the university. It enters the list of leading peer-reviewed scientific journals and editions recommended by the Highest certification commission at the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation for the publication of  main scientific results of doctor’s and Ph.D. theses. The journal is included into the information analytical system "Russian Index of Scientific Citing" (RISC). The collection of scientific works "Actual Issues of Physical Education and Sport" is also annually published.

Sports work is one of priority activities of the university staff.

17 Honoured Masters of Sports, 35 Masters of Sports of international class and more than 300 Masters of Sports have been trained in different sports at the University for the last five years.

At the moment more than 300 students - members of national teams of Russia and more than 500 students - members of combined national teams of Krasnodar Krai in Olympic, Paralympic, and non Olympic sports are being trained at the university. Arsen Galstyan (judo) won the summer Olympic Games 2012 in London. Silver medals were won by Alexander Ivanov (weightlifting), Besik Kudukhov (free-style wrestling), Dmitry Ushakov (trampolining), Rustam Totrov (Greco-Roman wrestling); the bronze – by Tatyana Chernova (combined events in track and field athletics). For the first time the students - Paralympians of the University took part in London Summer Olympic Games. The gold and silver medal in archery was won by Oleg Shestakov; the bronze medal was awarded to Larisa Volik (track and field athletics) and Vladimir Krivulya (powerlifting).

The university students and postgraduates won 26 gold, 5 silver and 5 bronze medals at the XXVII World Summer University games in 2013.

The university is working by system on developing conditions for elite athletes training. Elements of distance technologies are being applied for this purpose. Highly skilled athletes, having an individual training schedule, can study the disciplines, get advice on independent work via the university website. 9 prize-winners of the Olympic Games, 1 champion and 2 prize-winners of the Paralympic Games, 1 champion of Deaflympics, 32 world champions, and 63 champions of Russia are being trained at the University at the moment.

Kuban State University of Physical Education, Sport and Tourism, the only higher educational institution of physical education and sport of the Russian Federation, became the winner of the All-Russian competition for the right to stage the Volunteer center "Sochi 2014" at the university to attract and train volunteers of the XXII Olympic Winter and the XI Paralympic Winter Games 2014 in Sochi.

775 volunteers, including 439 students and the university staff and volunteers from 33 subjects of the Russian Federation who had hit the three-stage qualification standards and the two-stage training on the basis of the volunteer center were trained for the XXII Olympic Winter Games. 339 volunteers represented the university at the XI Paralympic Winter Games.

The main functional areas of volunteers at the Olympic Games were: "Personnel management", "Events Service", "Sports", "Linguistic services", " Olympic family assistants", "Arrival and departure services".

The autonomous Non-Commercial Organization “Sochi 2014 Organizing Committee” highly appreciated the contribution of KSUPhEST to the organization and staging of the XXII Olympic Winter and the XI Paralympic Winter Games of 2014 in Sochi.

Official gratitude was expressed to the University staff responsible for volunteer training from Deputy Prime Minister D.N. Kozak and President of Autonomous Non-Commercial Organization “Organizing Committee “Sochi-2014”. Each volunteer got memorable certificates of President of the International Olympic Committee Thomas Bach and President of the International Paralympic Committee Philipp Craven.

Now KSUPhEST Volunteer center is included into the Association of Volunteer centers of Russia established on May 27, 2014 and works in the system of formation of the Games heritage in the spheres of education, science, culture, ecology, physical education and sport, dealing with the issues of:

  development of volunteering and involvement of volunteers for service at sports, cultural and scientific events;

 scientific, methodical and information support of the Olympic education system in the region;

  support of student's voluntary initiatives in the socio-cultural sphere;

  cooperation with fan organizations, regional sports clubs and teams in different sports;

 prevention of addictions, healthy lifestyle promotion, social and ecological education.

Thus, as we believe, the results of the study of the main directions of professional activity of the staff of Kuban State University of Physical Education, Sport and Tourism testify indicate its progressive advance and considerable prospects of further increase of the role of the University in the improvement of the domestic system of physical culture and sport.