Institute of higher education: the first quarter of a century

The article presents the main conceptual and organizational foundations of the Institute of Higher Education of the National Academy of Educational Sciences of Ukraine. The main circumstances and concrete efforts to implement the plan for the creation and development of this Institute have been witnessed from the first person. The creation of the Institute of Higher Education was supposed to contribute to the fulfillment of such basic tasks of higher education. First, the development of higher education stimulated the formation of a young Ukrainian state, ensured the establishment of norms and values characteristic of a democratic state, and the development of the best qualities of human capital in Ukraine. Secondly, it was necessary to carry out radical changes in the entire system of higher education of Ukraine, to create a coherent national and modern system of higher education, which involved not only the implementation of changes at the national level, but also a significant restructuring of the universities themselves. Thirdly, the reform of higher education should have taken into account modern civilizational changes that necessitated transformational processes in the global university environment, such as the development of student-centeredness, the widespread introduction of new digital learning technologies, deeper integration into globalization processes, etc. Fourthly, despite the heated debate in political circles in the first years of Ukraine’s independence regarding the geopolitical orientations of the country’s development, more and more citizens became supporters of European integration, which was a natural, but difficult to implement, result of Ukraine’s accession to the Bologna process. The main achievements of the Institute of Higher Education in the conceptualization and instrumentalization of these and other tasks are described. Renewed on this basis, the higher education of Ukraine should become a driving force of society, capable of providing an innovative breakthrough in the scientific-technological, industrial-economic, social-humanitarian spheres.