As part of the realization of the 5-100 Project, director of the SUSU Project Office, Aleksandr Deev, participated in the First International Conference on Initiatives for Academic Excellence, held from June 30th to July 2nd in Saint Petersburg at ITMO University.
Representatives from the Russian Ministry of Education and Science, the 5-100 Project, agencies implementing analogous initiatives in Germany, France, Japan, and Canada, and provosts of Russian and foreign universities were involved in the conference.
Leading the conference’s program committee, Jamil Sadim, international expert in education andex-head of the International Bank’s Higher Education program, noted that programs for excellence are founded so that universities became unique accelerators for progress and world leaders in intellectual and scientific development.
Head of the Department in the German Counsel of Science, Sabine Brechenbeck, talked about the fact that many programs for excellence are being launched in Germany. Results from these programs are only requested after seven years, as real results are only received in the long term.
“Today, the selection of the group of strongest leaders among universities and their financial support from the government is a world-wide trend. Currently, throughout the world, 37 university excellence programs are being realized, analogous to the 5-100 Project for Increasing Competitiveness. The fact that our university was included confirms once more its high potential for becoming one of the 100 best universities in the world,” explained Aleksandr Deev.
As part of the forums’ events, Aleksandr Vladimirovich became acquainted with the most successful practices of organizations and realization of academic excellence initiatives, and also took part in discussions about possible instruments (ratings and so on) for evaluating the effectiveness of such initiatives.
In the future, SUSU plans to implement experience in monitoring universities’ realization of excellence initiatives, organization of accountability of universities and project offices, mechanisms for decision making in dispersing funds between universities, ensuring sustainable funding of academic excellence initiatives, and the benefits of other important initiatives.