Attitude of Russian teachers towards the new standards Daria Khanolainen Institute of Psychology and Education, Kazan Federal University, Kazan, Tatarstan, Russian Federation Abstract Purpose – In 2010, the Russian Federation began introducing the new educational standards as a national reform designed to improve education quality. This study aims to identify how teachers feel about the reform to evaluate its intermediate effects. Design/methodology/approach – The study took place in Tatarstan, one of the regions of Russia. The mixed-methods sequential explanatory design was used: the first phase involved a survey for 123 teachers and at the second phase 10 teachers participated in semi-structured face-to-face interviews. Findings – The findings of the study reveal that most teachers are still adapting to the new standards and feel only partly prepared to work within the new system. Teachers acknowledge that the reform is necessary, but there are some confusion and disagreement about what the new standards imply and how they should be implemented. Practical implications – The study argues that teachers have to both feel positive about reforms and perceive themselves to be prepared to address them before they can feel motivated to support them. The results might have been affected by social desirability bias as the number of those viewing the new standard positively is overwhelmingly high. At the same time, teachers report low levels of motivation. Originality/value – There is a clear dearth in scholarly literature dealing with the Russian educational context and available in English. In addition, there is hardly any research on Russian teachers’ motivation and attitude towards the new educational standards. Keywords Teachers, Secondary education, Quality standards, International standards, Attitudes, Educational policy, Standards, Education quality, Education reform, Teacher beliefs Paper type Research paper Introduction The world is rapidly and irreversibly changing and the Russian government recognizes that, as much as other countries, the Russian Federation needs to make sure that its education system corresponds to the current economic, environmental and social challenges. The introduction of the new federal educational standards in 2010 is one of the major attempts of the government to approach these challenges and to keep the system up-to-date. However, it is important to question whether these policy changes have had any significant impact on real teaching practices and have brought about the desired improvements. Though it is often argued across many countries that professional standards are vital for enforcing accountability in education, Darling-Hammond (1999) cautions that “standards are not a magic bullet” and instead of increasing quality they can sometimes limit the development of the field. Moreover, different contexts produce various factors affecting teachers’ attitude towards standards and these factors need to be carefully studied. Indeed, The work is performed under the auspices of the Russian Government Program of Competitive Growth of Kazan Federal University. QAE 27,3 254 Received 12 March 2018 Revised 7 March 2019 25 March 2019 1 April 2019 Accepted 1 April 2019 Quality Assurance in Education Vol. 27 No. 3, 2019 pp. 254-268 © Emerald Publishing Limited 0968-4883 DOI 10.1108/QAE-03-2018-0027 The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at: www.emeraldinsight.com/0968-4883.htm