Abstract: The object of this research is the education systems of various countries, particularly Russian Federation, United States, Great Britain, Switzerland, Finland, and Japan. The subject is the structure of education system of each country, as well as its key peculiarities. The author meticulously reveals the concept of the system of education of each country at hand, examines the positions of the state held in global rating of the quality of education systems over the period of 2013-2015, as well as provides the results of comparative analysis of separate aspects of the education systems of the aforementioned countries for determining the similarities and differences. The main conclusion consists in the statement that the education system of each of the examined countries represents a unique form of educating citizens that has established as a result of historical specificities of the country, as well as affected by the mentality and level of government control. The scientific novelty lies in studying of certain aspects of the education systems of Russian Federation, United States, Great Britain, and Switzerland from the new perspective. Comparative analysis of the initial level of education and policy of state exams, led to determination of the strengths and weaknesses in each system. Practical significance of this work is defined by the increased level of knowledge of the population on the structure and peculiarities of education systems in several countries, as well as potential application in various circumstances.

Keywords: Comparison of education systems, Structure of education, Quality of education, Higher education, Secondary education, Primary education, Educational system, Education, State school exam, Peculiarities of education systems

Abstract: The author examines the problems and prospects of application of the Socratic Method in legal clinical education. Legal clinical education plays an important role in professional training of lawyer, imparting practical skills to the use of theoretical knowledge in practical activity. Lack of continuity in methodological support of the educational activity in Russia results in the low practice-oriented outcome of legal training of the graduates. The implementation of Socratic Method allows formulating the required by the academic standard cultural and professional competencies. The author underlines the need for a qualitative methodological support of the legal clinical education. Socratic Method, used by the leading legal schools of the world, obtains a new meaning due to scientific technical progress and constant changes in the legal systems: the knowledge outdate within the year or several month; thus, legal education under the circumstances faces the task of not just “imparting” the knowledge onto minds of the students, but rather the skills for accumulating the new knowledge, as well critical thinking skills. The problems of implementation of the Socratic Method consist in difficulties of subjective and objective character. In first case, it implies the absence of the system of advanced methodological training of educators working in legal clinical education. In second case, it is the unpreparedness of students to independent thinking, orientation towards the opinion of educators, inability to defend their point of view, and lack of critical thinking skills. In the long term, there is a need to become familiar with the leading methodological practices of the foreign legal schools, as well as implement them into the system of Russian legal clinical education, taking into account its specificity.

Keywords: argumentation, critical thinking, methodology, educational standard, legal clinical education, legal clinic, Socratic seminar, Socratic Method, public speaking, practical training