The history of the formation of urban universities is traced, including the modern and promising stages of this history, the role of the most important processes: education, vocational training and scientific research. The functional and genetic typology of small universities is presented, as well as a diagram of the place of these universities in the process and flow of social development.

The vast majority of universities arose as small ones (with the exception of such examples as Stanford), for the needs of cities (medicine, commerce, law) and as an intellectual guarantee of the sovereignty of urban communes and municipalities. Science as an independent sphere was formed in universities in the 16th and 17th centuries as an intellectual force excessive for these cities (Table 1).

The peak of the genesis of universities in Europe occurred in the 16th century, which formed the basis for the origin and development of science. It took decades and even centuries for university education to become a noticeable social phenomenon, the number of educated people reached a certain point of crystallization of rather random activities into scientific activities, methodologically designed and gained authority. The war of town contra gown, "the city against the mantle", ended with a convincing victory for education and science. 

At the same time, cities, in conditions of an almost unchanged socio-cultural situation, could quite articulately submit a request for certain professions, while only universities themselves, elite "city fathers", as well as the highest nobility and clergy could formulate an educational request. In this regard, the early history of Moscow University is instructive and indicative. It should be recalled that Moscow University opened on January 25, 1755 in one of the rooms of the pharmacy at the Iversky Gate at 11 students. In 1809 (Speransky's educational reform), half a century later, two faculties of the Moscow Imperial University, Medical (Medical, 248 students) and Law (Political, 222 students), focused on professional training, and the other two, Mathematical (natural sciences – physics, chemistry, biology, geography, etc.) are concentrated here - 37 students and Literature - 153 students have a general educational character. Nevertheless, the task of forming "centaurs" - educated professionals as an intellectual elite - was urgent for Europe, Russia, and the United States. Unfortunately, in our country we have gone through and continue to go through so many reforms, transformations, perestroika and reshaping of education, including university education, that we have completely lost the fundamental, conceptual differences between education and vocational training, which neither at the student level, nor at the teacher level, nor at the public and state level, we can no longer articulate, what we do in universities.

The current stage of university development is reminiscent of the middle Ages: we are witnessing a boom of small universities, mostly ephemeral.

The current stage of university development is reminiscent of the middle Ages: we are witnessing a boom of small universities, mostly ephemeral.

The development of small universities can be characterized by a number of stages in their life cycle:

The current stage of university development is reminiscent of the middle Ages: we are witnessing a boom of small universities, mostly ephemeral.

1.  The emergence of an educational idea or the emergence/consciousness of an educational request/target group.

2.   Formation of the content of education based on the educational idea itself, opportunities and request of participants and target audience. At this stage there is formation of norms of activity, fixation of values and organizational structures of the university.

3.   Presumably, small universities, having passed the stage of formalization of educational content and internal structure, can develop variably:

·    in this state they can function for a long time, working for their target group;

·    may be transformed in the future into another organization, including a state educational institution or an institution of additional education, if this was not done initially, or become part of another educational structure;

·   Can end its existence if the educational request has been fulfilled, and the leader and his followers are absent at the moment.

The logic of development of small universities as a mobile academic community of professionals and learners seems to be as follows: from the realization of the educational idea and acquisition of the target group through the development of content and internal structure to a new status or liquidation.

In the framework of the study “Small University” [3] a functional-genetic typology of small universities was developed:

The functional-genetic typology is not exhaustive, but it sets a conceptual space for describing all possible variants of small and urban universities. For a more complete description it is necessary to introduce a historical vector: the already past real history of the university and the upcoming alternative perspectives.

However, not all types of universities are real: Possible functional and genetic types of mini-universities (Table 3).

Thus, out of 36 theoretically possible, only 13 are actually possible, but they create a rather motley and complex picture of small universities.

The theoretical model of a small university can be formulated in the following scheme (Figure1):

One of the results of social development is a set of required and or promising professions, the most important factor of social development is the educational frontier.

Modern small universities differ from their predecessors in conceptuality - the elaboration and detail of their concept, from which unfolds the organizational project of the university and its basic processes: scientific and project activities, educational and professional training. In general, the concept can be presented as follows (of course, each concept is unique in content) [3] (Figure 2).

As an example, the concept of the Invisible University is proposed, targeting residents of Ukraine and Ukrainian refugees in Europe [2]. This concept was proposed in October 2023.

Here are some episodes of world history: The 16th century, the “Little Glaciation” in Europe (84 bad and unproductive years) and - the heyday of European universities, Galileo, Durer, Bruno, Kepler, da Vinci, Copernicus, Nostradamus, Paracelsus, Brahe, Hobbes, Comenius: what a pleiad!

·         The Great Depression - and decisive advances in science, engineering and education: nuclear physics, radio engineering, television, aviation, biology and agronomy, technical universities and institutes in Europe, USA and USSR.

·         40s (World War II) – breakthrough in the military-industrial complex and in engineering and officer education, emergence of adult schools for pensioners and schools for the adaptation of World War II veterans in Great Britain and the USA.

·         the deepest crisis of the 90s in Russia and the former USSR countries – and the formation of new networks of universities, the emergence of a “second breath” in education, the restructuring of the entire system and organization of science.

The theory “economic crisis and war is an educational boom” is verified by the course of all new and recent history.

Table 1: Dynamics of the formation of a network of European universities.

Table 2: Functional-genetic typology of mini-universities.