Ural Federal University Students Create Cutting-Edge Digital Tools for Ekaterinburg
UrFU students are involved in the region’s digital processes, experts at the panel discussion “Digital Region: Managing Digital Transformation in the Public and Corporate Sectors” at the Innoprom industrial exhibition on July 10. In particular, students helped to monitor illegal deforestation in the Sverdlovsk region, analyze data for the development of Ekaterinburg, and create a digital platform for the Novokoltsovsky campus.
“UrFU students are involved not only in the standard educational process, but also in practices where we deal with data analytics issues, teach students on real cases, and work on tasks set for us by key business partners. For example, building a prototype of a platform for collecting feedback to formulate a development strategy for Ekaterinburg. Another example – data mining through social networks on social tensions in several monocities in the Sverdlovsk region. In other words, we respond to current market needs, and for this purpose we have our own set of methods and tools that have been successfully implemented”, says Alexander Tarasyev, Head of the Department of Systems Analysis and Decision Making and Academic Director of the Master’s Program in Digital Project Management at UrFU.
Students are also involved in projects commissioned by regional ministries. In particular, the Minister of Digital Development and Communications of the Sverdlovsk Region Mikhail Ponomarkov explained how they analyze data that will help improve the lives of residents.
“We have signed several agreements with universities under which we develop digital volunteering: we involve students in solving specific tasks. For example, last year we solved a task for the Ministry of Natural Resources of the Sverdlovsk Region: we identified illegal deforestation based on digital data. The second example – for the Novokoltsovsky Campus, which was launched by the Governor of the Sverdlovsk Region Evgeny Kuivashev, UrFU students created a digital solution – a platform to support students”, says Mikhail Ponomarkov.
It is necessary to introduce digitalization not only in the educational process but also at all levels, as ordered by President Vladimir Putin, believes Evgeny Gurarii, the Assistant Plenipotentiary Envoy of the President of the Russian Federation to the Urals Federal District. Digitalization is changing the paradigm of territorial development, placing new demands not only on technological aspects but also on management approaches. There is a growing need for managers capable of having a comprehensive interdisciplinary vision of the prospects for sustainable regional development in the context of the country’s overall growth and its integration into the global economy.