NEW PARADIGMS OF MODERN EDUCATION: DIFFERENT APPROACHES AND CHALLENGES

Education is relatively independent. It is able to exert an active influence on the functioning and development of the society. As part of the socio-economic progress, education is a priority of state policy. A person, who is a part of workforce in public production, has to correspond with the level of contemporary socio-economic development of the state. The state of the economy, industry and production depends on the level of education. It acts as a factor of reproduction of social and professional structure of society. The education system models the individuals, impacting the public life, imparts scientific knowledge and adapts it to the mass consciousness. Through its cultural function education has an impact on the spiritual life of the society, the set of spiritual and moral ideas and values, which is stored in the national culture and is delivered via education. Education is a cultural phenomenon, and being brought up in a cultural environment, a person co-opts not only here and now but also the past of his/er ancestors. The cultural environment is also needed for his "spiritual sedentariness", for his attachment to his native land, for his moral self-discipline and socialization. Culture is a set of outcomes and processes of any social activity of people. Unlike the nature, which is a mere set of external conditions of existence, independent from a human, culture governs the behaviour of people, and cultural values are created and accumulated on the basis of selection of certain types of behaviour and experience of people. Education and society are inseparable. Education is influenced by all the global challenges faced by the society. Education is a modifying force of the society and in many ways it defines the face of the society. The functions of modern education are to transform the inner world of an individual on the bases of humanistic ideas, to raise the level of culture. The social role of education is its ability to influence the development of certain trends in the society, to prepare and train professionals to address the global and local issues of our time.