Russians visit Nuffic for seminars on Bologna
30 May 2008
An official delegation of one of Russia’s best technical universities visited Nuffic to learn more about the modernization of higher education in the Netherlands.
The visit took place from 18 to 24 May. The visit was financed by the Russian Education project, one of the national projects supervised by Russian president Dmitry Medvedev to modernize Russia’s education system, which suffered a lot during the financial crisis of the 90’s.
Perm State Technical University
The delegation of the Perm State Technical State University (PSTU) consisted of 26 senior managers and academic staff members. With 27,500 students it is the biggest university in Perm, an industrial city with 1 million citizens, near the Ural mountains. The delegation was headed by Ekaterina Vershinina, a high official of the Ministry of Education.
Seminars
The visitors attended seminars on several topics, including the transfer from the old system to the Bachelor/Master’s system and the implementation of the ECTS system. Russia agreed to take part in the Bologna Agreement to establish one European higher education area from Lisbon and Bologna to Vladivostok; by September 2009 Russian universities should be ready for this.
Bologna process
The Russians also visited TU Delft and The Hague University to learn more about the Bologna process. The University of Amsterdam and the Hogeschool van Amsterdam informed the Russian delegation about co-operation and experiences between Universities of Research and Universities of Applied Science. The Dutch Ministry of Education also participated by giving a seminar on trends and developments in higher education in the Netherlands.
Test case
The seminars are seen as a test case. When all partners are satisfied, the Russians would like to send more high profile delegations on educational trips to Holland over the next two years. Russian universities are also interested in meeting potential partners for institutional co-operations.
The seminars for the university from Perm were organized by the Promotion Department of Nuffic and Neso Russia.