Abstract: the article describes the periods of socialization of orphans in higher education (adaptation, main and final), methods, criteria of efficiency of socialization, as well as the barriers to the successful socialization of orphans. The authors identify barriers to the successful socialization of orphans in high school, emphasize the features of the initial stage of adaptation to the university. Among the main reasons, one chooses the wrong choice of specialty, poor knowledge obtained from general educational institutions, poor awareness of one’s own prospects, negative influence of the former environment, personal laziness and negative orphans’ social experience in the past. According to the authors, all this provokes a person to the propensity for deviant behavior, which is the cost of education or due to the lack of a program of socio-psychological support.
Keywords: educational work, orphans, persons from children-orphans and children left without parental care, socio-psychological support, socialization, agents of socialization, social interaction