Speaking at a seminar hosted by National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE) last week, Shuhua Liu, Vice Director of the Center for International Education Research at China’s Zhejiang University, admitted that, while they had long been involved in online education, no one had expected it to get such a boost.
Tag: 5Top100
President Vladimir Putin has instructed the Russian government to consider implementing applied baccalaureate (AB) degree programs at some of this country’s universities. The government has until June 30 to look into the issue.
While teaching theory to the best higher education standards, AB degree programs emphasize practical training. Through intensive internships, graduates learn hands-on skills and develop an expertise that enhances their job market suitability.
In an earlier interview to the RIA Novosti news agency, Valery Falkov, Russia’s Minister for Science and Higher Education, pointed out that, when introducing AB, it was imperative to carefully assess each industry’s needs and understand just how many jobs it could make available to those completing AB programs.
Experts agree that working with employers is of the essence. There is a consensus among Project 5-100 institutions that the content and standards of AB degree programs should be developed in close collaboration with industrial partners.
Thus, Aliya Bagautdinova, head of the Department of Academic Affairs at ITMO University, says that the endeavor calls for constant, full-scale cooperation between universities and major employers, whether leading real-sector companies or education, research and engineering design institutions, which can be expected to take on AB program graduates.
It would make sense to build on existing academia-industry links when putting together such programs, say experts. Some Project 5-100 universities are already seeking to involve their long-standing business partners in the process. According to Andrei Raigorodsky, director of the Phystech School of Applied Mathematics and Informatics at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT), engaging active industry professionals is good for narrowing the gap between theory and practice. Several of Russia’s high-tech and banking giants, including 1C, ABBYY, Sberbank (and its SberTech subsidiary), Scientific Design Bureau of Computing Systems, Tinkoff Bank, Yandex, etc., which have endowed chairs and labs at the school, have in the past contributed to designing its bachelor’s and master’s programs.
AB offers students an opportunity to acquire labor market-relevant skills, forge professional ties, get first-hand exposure to industry, gain valuable project work experience, and master collective and individual problem-solving techniques.
AB degree programs could be used to train in-demand employees for a wide range of industries, from engineering, computer manufacturing and transport to digital transformation, media and design to management and documentation and record keeping (and the list goes on). According to Yury Filatov, who heads the Institute of Fundamental Engineering Education at St Petersburg Electrotechnical University ETU “LETI”, applied baccalaureate will not only help align higher education with the needs of established industries but also train the workforce for nascent ones.
Quelle: The Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation
German and Russian scientists will study the mechanisms of formation and evolution of organic substances in relation to the formation of stars and planetary systems. As part of Project 5-100, the Ural Federal University (UrFU) is creating the first research group in partnership with the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, which is currently the first group of this kind in Russia.
Scientists of the Astrochemistry and Extraterrestrial Physics Laboratory which is being established in Ekaterinburg at UrFU and their counterparts from the Center for Astrochemical Studies of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics will study the impact of various physical processes on the organic substance evolution in space.
The institutions will cooperate in the form of a „partner research group“; its formation has been approved by the Presidium of the Max Planck Society. The German party will allocate about 1.5 million rubles per year for collaborative research in the next three years.
According to Anton Vasyunin, head of the Astrochemistry and Extraterrestrial Physics Laboratory which is being established at the Department of Astronomy, Geodesy and Environmental Monitoring of the Institute of Natural Sciences and Mathematics at UrFU, the group will study how organic substances form and evolve in the areas where stars and planetary systems form, i.e. in extremely low temperature and density. Expert says that the origins of life in the universe is one of the most fundamental issues for interdisciplinary studies in modern science, and astrophysical research aimed at studying molecular composition of the interstellar medium considerably contributes to tackling this issue. Russian specialists will contribute to joint work primarily by conducting theoretical, quantitative and observational research of the evolution of chemical composition of interstellar objects.
„The group will work primarily in the sphere of astrochemistry, which is a relatively new discipline integrating physics, astronomy and chemistry,“ says Mr. Vasyutin. „The group partnering the Max Planck Society will be the first one of this kind in Russia. Partnership with our German counterparts will encourage research visits and exchange of ideas between the parties. As the relationship takes hold, experts would expect that this bilateral activity will increase and strengthen international cooperation in science.
Star formation in general and, specifically, astrochemistry are studied by a small group of scientists in the world, and there are few such specialists in Russia. „We have had a unique chance of creating the „Russian astrochemistry“, as, among other things, we teach special courses at UrFU. We hope that we will achieve considerable results studying physical processes which had not been considered, such as small-scale instability in a dusty plasma and interaction of cosmic rays with cosmic dust particles, the chemical evolution of the interstellar medium and formation of organic molecules,“ said Anna Punanova who works in the laboratory.
Astrochemical studies are a step towards answering one of the fundamental questions of modern science regarding the origins of life in the universe. In Russia, research related to astrochemistry is conducted mainly at the Institute of Astronomy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Faculty of Chemistry at MSU, the Astro Space Center, Vernadsky Institute of Geochemistry and Analytical Chemistry of Russian Academу of Sciences, the Institute of Applied Physics of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IAP RAS) in Nizhny Novgorod, and Boreskov Institute of Catalysis.
Quelle: Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation
2012 startete mit dem 5Top100-Programm die russische Exzellenzinitative. Bis 2020 sollen fünf der teilnehmenden Hochschulen zu den 100 Besten der Welt gehören. Was wurde bisher erreicht? In einem Interview mit der russischen Zeitung „Lenta.ru“ skizzierte Aleksandr Powalko, stellvertretender Bildungsminister, einige der bisherigen Entwicklungen.
Dem Projekt 5Top100 schließen sich sechs weitere russische Universitäten an, die als Favoriten aus der zweiten Förderrunde hervorgegangen sind. Insgesamt hatten sich 34 Hochschulen um eine Aufnahme in das Programm beworben.
Simon Marginson, Professor für internationale Hochschulbildung am Institut für Bildungsforschung der Universität London, analysiert, wie das russische Hochschul- und Wissenschaftssystem nach zwei weitgehend verschlafenen Jahrzehnten allmählich an globale Entwicklungen in Wissenschaft und Forschung aufschließen will.
Während sich die politischen Beziehungen zwischen Deutschland und Russland im Zuge der Krim-Annexion und der Ukraine-Krise verschlechtert haben, scheint dies die bilateralen Wissenschaftsbeziehungen bisher nicht negativ zu beeinflussen.
In der F.A.Z. vom 15. Juli erschien unter dem Titel „Russische Exzellenz, auf Linie gebracht“ ein Artikel über die Exzellenzinitiative „5Top100„. Die langjährige Moskau-Korrespondentin Kerstin Holm erklärt darin das Vorstoßen zweier russischer Hochschulen in die Top 100 der international renommiertesten Universitäten.
Die russische „5Top100“-Exzellenzinitiative zeigt erste Erfolge: In das neu vorgestellte QS University Ranking by Subject schafften es erstmals zehn russische Hochschulen.