Siberian Federal University: Siberian Federal University wins the special part of the grant of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of Russia under the Priority 2030 program
On 5 October 2021, the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of Russia announced the results of the second round of the competition for universities under the Priority 2030 program. Siberian Federal University entered the pool of universities that will receive support in the framework of the Territorial Leadership track.
Priority 2030, being the largest program of state support for Russian universities in the history of Russia, is aimed at creating a cluster of leading universities.
In total, over 400 universities applied for the program, but in the first round of the competition, which took place at the end of September, the commission of the Ministry selected only 106 universities. These institutions received the basic part of the grant in the amount of 100 million roubles.
Not every university managed to get into the second part of the selection — only 54 universities received a recommendation. Each of the nominees had to define a track in accordance with their development strategy: Territorial or Sectoral Leadership or Research Leadership.
Additional defences took place in early October. The Council for Supporting Development Programs within the framework of Priority 2030 includes Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation Dmitry Chernyshenko (chairman), Minister of Science and Higher Education of Russia Valery Falkov, director of Skolkovo’s Institute for Public Strategies Andrey Volkov (scientific director of the Council), president of Sberbank Herman Gref, president of the Russian Academy of Sciences Alexander Sergeev and others.
Siberian Federal University chose the Territorial Leadership track. The defence took place on 2 October 2021. The team included SibFU rector Maksim Rumiantsev, SUEK director-general Stepan Solzhenitsyn and Governor of Krasnoyarsk Territory Alexander Uss.
«Preparations for the defence of the university development program were quite intensive. Our management team had a desire to present the key rates of strategic changes to the Priority 2030 Commission. Therefore, the preparation for the defence was responsible and well-balanced to make our presentation convincing. It was not easy to fit a year and a half of productive discussions on the next stage of the university’s development in, first, 7 then even less – in 5 minutes.
But this strict timeframe allowed us to concentrate on the main thing – on the priorities and essence of the changes.
By the way, some of the questions posed by the members of the Commission, for me personally, became the subject of reflections on the mechanisms for implementing the ideas stated in our program. After the defence, I continued answering these questions, focusing on the details that are significant for the implementation of our projects.
I was delighted by technological, qualified, rather dynamic and at the same time demanding, but comfortable format of defence because of the level of its organization», concluded Maksim Rumiantsev.
The participation of the head of the region in the defence confirmed the region’s interest in having a leading university and brought additional points to SibFU.
The second stage of defence brought 46 universities from 22 constituent entities of all federal districts of Russia, which became the recipients of the special part of the Priority 2030 grant. These are 28 universities claiming for Territorial/Sectoral Leadership and 18 for Research Leadership. The winners in each of the tracks were divided into three groups in accordance with how much money would be required to implement the university development programs.
The total financing of Priority 2030 federal program by the end of 2022 will amount to more than 47 billion roubles, of which financing for the base part is more than 20 billion roubles for two years, and the special part of the grant will be more than 26 billion roubles.