After a comprehensive review, Irkutsk universities were at the center of rumors about a status downgrade, the pedagogical university became an academy, and the linguistic university kept its status. IGPU is already preparing to reissue documents, while 2009 graduates and current applicants will still receive university diplomas. The article also says that in Priangarye, as part of higher education reform, university offices and branches continue to close.

Russian universities undergo a comprehensive review every five years. It includes licensing (confirmation of the right to carry out educational activities) and accreditation (confirmation of the right to issue a state-recognized diploma).
IGLU and ISPU were inspected by Moscow commissions. Rumors immediately spread around the city that the institutions would be downgraded to academy status. At the end of last week, it became known that the pedagogical university had become an academy, while the foreign languages university remained a university.
– We expect the order on the renaming any day now. But in order to reissue all documents for a different type of higher education institution, we will need six months, – said Olga Kuznetsova, vice-rector for academic affairs at ISPU. – I can say with certainty that our 2009 graduates will receive a university diploma. Applicants this summer will also enroll in the university, but they will graduate, like all other current students, from the academy.
The situation for the linguistic university is more favorable.
- We received the official order-confirmation only 3 days ago, - comments Inna Kapichnikova, vice-rector for academic affairs at IGLU. – Although we learned the result back on March 11 from acquaintances over the phone. Of course, we were prepared for anything. Especially since even well-known and respected universities in Barnaul and St. Petersburg have now been renamed academies.
Our main advantage is that there are only four linguistic universities in the country. Moreover, the Moscow experts had no complaints about us. Both conclusions they made based on the inspection results were positive.
Meanwhile, as part of the reform of higher education in the Angara region, representative offices and branches of universities continue to close. Thus, over the past year, the Irkutsk representative offices of the East Siberian Technological University (Ulan-Ude) and the Novosibirsk State Academy of Water Transport, as well as the Osetrovsky representative office in Ust-Kut of the Moscow State Academy of Water Transport, ceased to exist. Tomsk State Pedagogical University closed its branch in Bratsk, and the Moscow State University of Economics, Statistics and Informatics closed its branch in Irkutsk. In addition, in Zima, as well as in the Nizhneilimsky and Cheremkhovsky districts, the representative offices of a number of Irkutsk universities ceased operations.