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Introduction. As part of the Bologna process since September 1, 2016, the Russian government has granted the right to award academic degrees to leading educational and scientific organizations on par with Dissertation Defense Councils under Higher Attestation Commission, modeled after the system adopted at OECD member-states and universities. Currently, 27 educational and scientific organizations are exercising this right. However, the problematic issue is the assessment of their efficiency. The purpose of this research is to analyze the efficiency of Dissertation Councils of the above-mentioned scientific and educational organizations by comparing them in terms of efficiency with classical Dissertation Defense Councils established by the decree of the Ministry of Education and Scie nce of Russia. Materials and Methods. The research objects are Dissertation Councils of scientific and educational organizations of higher education (hereinafter referred to as pilot organizations) that have the right of independent award of academic degrees according to the Federal Law No. 148 issued on May 23, 2016 “On Amendments to Article 4 of the Federal Law ‘On research and state scientific and technological policy’”. Dissertation Councils efficiency analysis is made using following indicators: Dissertation Councils members’ compliance with the Higher Attestation Commission requirements, structure of candidate and doctoral defenses, Dissertation Councils members’ publications and publication activity of degree seekers. Statistical data analysis methods were applied including mean comparison me thods, clustering, factor analysis. Results. There are 337 pilot Dissertation Defense Councils and 374 classical Dissertation Defense Councils. In 2016, 24% of defenses were reviewed by pilot councils of the total number of defenses in classical Dissertation Councils of the entire network. In 2018 70 doctoral and 591 candidate defenses in “pilot” councils were held, amounting to 7% of the total number of defe nses in classical Dissertation Councils. Discussion and Conclusion. The article will be useful to the heads of federal authorities making management decisions in the field of training and certification of highly qualified scientific personnel, to the chairmen and scientific secretaries of dissertation councils, as well as to scientific and pedagogical workers carrying out analytical studies in this subject area.

Aim. The presented study aims to develop a scientifically based method of obtaining quantitative indicators for the staffing of priority areas through the training of highly qualified scientific personnel.   Tasks. The authors create a methodology for comparing the topics of dissertation research (scientific specialties and dissertation topics) with the priority areas formulated in the Strategy for the Scientific and Technological Development of the Russian Federation (STD RF); conduct a survey of candidates of sciences to learn their assessment of the compliance ofdissertation research topics with the priority areas of the STD RF strategy and to identify the peculiarities of the professional development of candidates of sciences after the defense of their dissertations; analyze the staffing of the priority areas of the STD RF strategy through the training of highly qualified personnel (HQP) based on the results of the survey and the developed methodology for matching the topic of the dissertation with the topics of the priority areas of the STD RF strategy and the retention of the trained HQP in the scientific and technological field corresponding to such priority areas; identify Competence Centers for the training of HQP for the staffing of the priority directions of the STD RF strategy.   Methods. A methodology of step-by-step matching of dissertation research and priority areas according to the criteria of "scientific specialty" and "dissertation title" is developed using three approaches: expert, keyword-based, and embedding-based. A sociological survey of 8,402 candidates of sciences was conducted to obtain quantitative indicators.   Results. It is found that only one out of three candidates of sciences who defended a dissertation in one of the priority areas continues to engage in scientific activity on the subject of his dissertation after the defense. Over half of the candidates of sciences (around 60 %) whose dissertation topic corresponds to the priorities of the STD RF strategy occasionally engage in scientific activities on the subject of their dissertation research. Around 12 % of candidates of sciences stopped developing their research topics after defending their dissertations.   Conclusions. The potential of HQP trained in the subject of priority areas is not fully realized. The number of HQP that remain focused on the topics of the priority areas of the STD RF strategy can serve as a benchmark for the formation of indicators of staffing efficiency in the priority areas of scientific and technological development.