Translation. Region: Russian Federation –
Source: Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University –
An important disclaimer is at the bottom of this article.
A cross-university review session, initiated by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, has opened at Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University. The goal of this event, which will be held annually at all universities participating in the Priority 2030 program, is to evaluate the universities' implementation of development programs, highlight successful practices and problem areas, identify areas for growth, and prepare useful recommendations for the development of universities across the country.
Over the course of two days, intensive work is taking place at the St. Petersburg Polytechnic University, involving university leadership, institute directors, heads of research laboratories, faculty, and industry representatives.
Experts from the Federal State Autonomous Institution "Sociocentre"—the operator of the largest state development programs in science and higher education in the Russian Federation—will assess SPbPU's development prospects:
Dmitry Shabalkin, Vice-Rector for Innovative Development and Digital Transformation at Ulyanovsk State University; Evgeny Pogrebnyak, Vice-Rector for Digital Transformation at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO University) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation; Polina Shelupanova, Associate Professor at Tomsk State University of Control Systems and Radioelectronics and Head of the Department of Economic Security at TUSUR; and Sergey Sedykh, Research Fellow at the Institute of Chemical Biology and Fundamental Medicine of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
The events are held in the format of a strategic session with working groups in the following areas: "Management System for Achieving Technological Leadership. Development Team," "Research and Development as the Basis for Competitive Technological Solutions," "Engineering Education," and "Strategic Technological Projects."
On the first day of the cross-university assessment, SPbPU First Vice-Rector Vitaly Sergeev addressed all participants with a welcoming address: "The assessment represents a comprehensive university evaluation system and also gives us the opportunity to formulate elements of tactics and strategy for addressing the challenges facing the university. On behalf of the university, I would like to thank the experts. I am confident that the recommendations resulting from the assessment will be useful and will be implemented."
Vitaly Vladimirovich noted that, in order to achieve technological leadership, in accordance with the approved University Development Strategy and Program, SPbPU will focus its efforts on three key scientific and technological areas (KNTD), as well as on transforming engineering education. The speaker also emphasized the prospects and importance of developing a qualified partnership model.
Next, Dmitry Shabalkin, an expert from the Sociocenter, took the floor and outlined the main goal of the cross-university assessment: "To understand the university's stakes in achieving technological leadership, as well as what internal changes need to be made and whether they are worthwhile."
The speaker proposed considering the technologies for implementing all three key scientific and technological areas (KSTAs) from the perspective of their scalability to other university structures.
Yuri Fomin, Vice-Rector for Research and Chief Designer of the Scientific and Technical Conference No. 3, "Artificial Intelligence for Solving Cross-Industry Problems," presented a report in which he outlined three hypotheses for transforming SPbPU's research activities. He reiterated the principles used to define SPbPU's key scientific and technological development areas. He also noted that the market economy is pushing universities to compete for resources and highly qualified specialists.
"We need to move to a space of different economic models for the university's departments. We have identified three economic models for ourselves: educational, scientific and educational, and scientific and industrial," the speaker noted, presenting options for distributing SPbPU institutes and research teams according to these three models.
Vice Rector for Educational Affairs Lyudmila Pankova noted that the main task now is the transition to a new model of engineering education: "Our goal is to take the best of what has been used in education previously and build a new system of engineering education. We are currently focusing on single-cycle higher education, specialized higher education as an alternative to retraining programs, and postgraduate studies, including industrial ones."
Next, Alexey Borovkov, Chief Designer of the KNTN-1 "System Digital Engineering" and Director of the "Digital Engineering" School, took the floor. He began his presentation by presenting a unique development from St. Petersburg Polytechnic University—the CML-Bench®️ Digital Platform for the Development and Application of Digital Twins—which enables the rapid design and production of competitive high-tech products for various industries to ensure technological leadership within the framework of the National Digital Twin Program (NTP). The platform is unparalleled in Russia and the world in terms of the volume of integrated domestic and foreign software and the number of digital and design solutions presented on it—more than 375,000.
Then the floor was given to the director of the Institute of Mechanical Engineering, Materials and Transport of SPbPU, chief designer of KNTN-2 "Materials, Technologies, Production" Anatoly Popovich.
He noted that materials, technology, and production are an inseparable triad: “The concept is that we don’t move from left to right, but rather first develop a product using a specific technology, and then we develop the necessary material for it.”
The speaker presented five projects included in KNTN-2, focusing specifically on the project "Scientific and Technological Foundations for the Development of Science-Intensive Production, Repair, and Manufacture of Power Engineering Parts for Civil and Special Purpose Needs." The chief designer of KNTN-2 explained that the project has already successfully completed testing, and pilot batches are currently being manufactured. He demonstrated a product created using additive technologies to the cross-industry review participants.
Yuri Fomin, Chief Designer of KNTN-3, added: "As part of KNTN-3, we plan to create a platform for working with multimodal data to solve engineering problems. Here, we plan to leverage Polytechnic University's competitive advantage—a global portfolio of qualified customers who share verified engineering data with us—as well as the extreme diversity of our partners."
Each speaker's presentation was followed by a lively professional discussion. Throughout the day, participants in the cross-university review also interacted in working groups. In interactive formats, university representatives, institute heads, partners, and experts discussed how the university should be structured; how the university's structure differs from its desired future; which operational tools require significant changes, which new operational tools are missing, and what can be done about them. The first day concluded with a tour of SPbPU's facilities.
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