Published on: 2026-09-17
Source: Moscow Government – Правительства Москвы –
An important disclaimer is at the bottom of this article.
The Presidium of the Moscow Government reviewed the report of the Deputy Mayor of Moscow for Social Development Issues Anastasia Rakova on the implementation of the comprehensive career guidance program for schoolchildren in the capital. Based on the discussion results Sergey Sobyanin made the decision to expand the geography and audience of the capital’s comprehensive career guidance program.
Starting from January 2027, eighth-grade students of Moscow schools will be invited to participate. In addition, the network of sites will expand — the new hub will be the “Professions of the Future” practical training center in Pechatniki, where schoolchildren will be able to get acquainted with in-demand professions in a practice-oriented format.
Thus, the comprehensive career guidance program for schoolchildren will continue to scale in accordance with the development strategy of Moscow’s social protection system until 2030, providing every teenager with the opportunity to make an informed choice of future profession and build a successful career in a dynamically changing world.
The relevance of the career guidance program for schoolchildren
Moscow is a city of great opportunities for education, work, career, and professional development. It is home to leading universities and colleges, the largest companies and enterprises, with modern industries actively developing and new specialized directions emerging. For schoolchildren, this opens up many possible trajectories and at the same time makes the ability to navigate them and consciously choose their own path especially important.
Today, decisions have to be made in a world that is rapidly changing due to technology, digitalization, and the widespread adoption of artificial intelligence. Traditional professions are gradually losing their relevance and becoming a thing of the past, new specialties are emerging, and the set of skills required to work in various fields is expanding. Therefore, it is important for a teenager not just to decide where to enroll after school, but rather to better understand themselves: their abilities, interests, and strengths, to see different opportunities for their professional application, and on this basis, to build their own model of success.
This is exactly where the city’s comprehensive career guidance program helps, the implementation of which began in 2023 by decision of the Moscow Government. In September 2026, the fourth season of the country’s first interdepartmental program, which united the opportunities, Department of Education and Science of the City of Moscow and the metropolitan employment service: schools, colleges, and universities, the center “Professions of the Future”, as well as the city’s largest employers. Together, they are building a unified career guidance system that helps schoolchildren better understand their strengths, get acquainted with specific fields of education and professions, learn which specialties suit them best, see potential educational and career paths, as well as directly communicate with representatives of colleges, universities, and employers, and receive expert advice before making important decisions.
The main goal of comprehensive career guidance is not to choose a profession for the teenager, but to provide him with tools, knowledge, and practical experience so that he can independently make decisions about his future and use the educational and professional opportunities that Moscow offers him.
Career guidance program for ninth-grade students
The first to join the comprehensive career guidance program were ninth-grade students. This is due to age-related characteristics: at 14–16 years old, teenagers are forced to make important decisions that determine their immediate educational and professional path.
Since 2023, a unique comprehensive career guidance program has been implemented in Moscow. It helps young people choose the profession that suits them best and is in demand by the city. Over several years, more than 200,000 ninth graders have participated in it.
The program for ninth graders includes several stages: testing and consultations at the “Professions of the Future” center, professional trials at colleges, profession festivals and forums, excursions to employers, and open house days.
The “Professions of the Future” center introduces teenagers to in-demand specialties, including through a unique interactive 5D cinema, which has no analogues in Russia, and a VR simulator that allows trying roles such as welder, turner, cook, baker, or electric train driver.
A key stage is career guidance testing, after which school students are invited to individual consultations with career mentors to interpret the results. In addition, meetings with representatives of Moscow colleges are held at the center’s venue: the students are told about the training programs. In the 2025/2026 academic year, the center was visited by over 80 thousand school students.
Another important stage of the program is professional trials in modern workshops and laboratories of 43 metropolitan colleges. They help teenagers immerse themselves more deeply in the area of interest and practically understand whether the chosen specialty suits them. In the 2025/2026 academic year, ninth graders underwent 90 thousand professional trials.
In addition, the kids went on tours of more than 500 of the largest organizations and enterprises in the capital, getting acquainted with potential employers and production processes in various fields.
The results of this year’s admissions campaign demonstrate the effectiveness of the program: 93 percent of ninth-graders who enrolled in colleges participated in at least one of its events.
Interaction with parents
The path to professional self-determination for a student is usually not taken alone: the support and involvement of parents play an important role in this process. Often, they rely on familiar ideas about in-demand professions formed in previous decades, when professional trajectories looked different. Therefore, educational work with parents is an important component of the program.
A practical tool has become the monthly meetings “PROSaturday: Your Child’s Future.” They take place during the academic year at the “Professions of the Future” center. The program provides parents with a clear navigation through the modern labor market and educational opportunities.
Career guidance program for 10th–11th grade students
Starting from 2026, the program covers students of 10th and 11th grades. It includes students of socio-economic, humanitarian, and universal profiles aimed at entering higher educational institutions.
The program includes several stages. The first one is the “Moscow – City of Opportunities” training, developed individually for each profile. Teenagers are told how to choose a profession based on their interests, abilities, and the demand for the specialty, as well as how to take the first step toward building their own model of success.
A career mentor immerses high school students in the world of professions: students can choose the fields that interest them the most. Among the most popular are media and communications — 15 percent, arts and creativity — 15 percent, economics and management — 14 percent, service and tourism — 14 percent, and social sciences — 10 percent.
Then the teenagers undergo vocational guidance testing. The results are uploaded to the “Moscow Electronic School” (“MESH”). This makes it possible to identify the student’s strengths and match them with the real demands of the labor market.
The next stage is an individual consultation with a career mentor. Specialists interpret the test results for each student and help them navigate the choice of future profession and study profile.
The students find answers to important questions for them: for example, what direction and specialty they can apply for with the chosen subjects for the Unified State Exam (USE), what jobs are available for the chosen specialty and which subjects are required to pass the exams for it, as well as which specialized universities exist and where is the best place to look for information about them.
Then high school students meet with university representatives. They learn about study programs and admission conditions. Currently, the project has 56 partner universities, including Lomonosov Moscow State University, the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration, the National Research University Higher School of Economics, the Plekhanov Russian University of Economics, Patrice Lumumba Russian University of Peoples’ Friendship, Moscow City University of Education, Bauman Moscow State Technical University, and others.
The program concludes with a master class “Create Your Own Success Model.” Teenagers are introduced to useful digital services that can help them choose a university, earn extra points, and find options for targeted education.
More than 13 thousand teenagers participated in the project, and over 90 percent of them have decided on their career choice and study profile. A total of about 35 thousand senior school students from the capital will undergo career guidance by the end of the current year.
To find out how the capital has changed over the past years, what initiatives aimed at making the citizens’ lives even more comfortable are currently being implemented, and what awaits Moscow and its residents in the near future, you can go to large-scale special project on the mos.ru portal, dedicated to the development of key sectors of Moscow. These include transport, industry, healthcare, education, sports, and the construction sector.
On the project page “Education” it tells how educational institutions are transformed during reconstruction under the program “My School” and how the update affects the quality of education. Reequipping colleges allows students to acquire practical skills during their studies and obtain professions in demand on the labor market.
Quickly get the main news on the official Moscow city channels in messengers “Max” and “Telegram”.
Please note; This information is raw content obtained directly from the information source. It is an accurate report of what the source claims and does not necessarily reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.