International Polytechnic Week - 2019

“Sustainable partnership via Students Project Marathon”

Dates: May 20-26, 2019

The International Forum “International Polytechnic Week – 2019” was held in the period of May, 20-26, 2019. This year, partner universities from Germany, Great Britain, Finland, the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, China, Iran, India and Turkey came to IPW. Russian universities also showed great interest in the international forum: colleagues from TPU, PFUR, ITMO, MSTU STANKIN, KFU, RSHU, VolgGU, NSTU and NRU MGSU came to Polytechnic University. Altogether, more than 100 foreign and Russian experts took part in the events of the Week.

The central event of the International Polytechnic Week - the plenary session - traditionally began with an official opening ceremony. Vice Rector for International Relations D.G. ARSENIEV welcomed the guests of the forum and outlined the key topic of this year’s discussion: can international student science marathons ensure a stable inter-university partnership?

Yury SNISARENKO, representative of the Committee on Science and Higher Education (CSHE), Director of the Coordination Center for International Science and Technical and Educational Programs, also welcomed the guests of the IPW. On behalf of the Administration of St. Petersburg, he wished the participants productive negotiations, strengthening existing and establishing new working contacts, noting that Polytechnic University for many years remained a “generator” of new ideas and formats for the international academic space.

The plenary session began with the presentation of SPbPU: Alla MAZINA, Deputy Head of the Department of International Education, presented the report on “Sustainable partnership through joint student marathons.” The Student Project Marathon is a new interaction format that Polytechnic University is now ready to offer its partners, building on successful joint practices with the Leibnitz University of Hannover, the Technical University of Berlin, and Siemens. Its concept is that a joint international team under the leadership of a professor solves scientific and technical problems. This format allows all participants to achieve the desired indicators.

Discussion of this topic followed up on Wednesday on the seminar “Joints Student Projects” where representatives of SPbPU presented new joint project with our strategic partner TU Graz – Project Student Marathon. Project Marathon was implemented in March 2019 and students will work together on their joint projects till December 2019. In the beginning of winter all the teams will present the results of research work in the framework of Student Conference that will take part in SPbPU. Representative from TU Berlin, Anton Dybov, also made a presentation of joint student project with the SPbPU Institute of Computer Science and Technology. TU Berlin students, participated this project, visited SPbPU just right during the IPW-2019.

Doubtless the star of the Week was the director of the Summer School of the University of Utrecht (the Netherlands) Jeroen TORENBEEK. Prof. TORENBEEK presented best practices of managing the largest summer school in Europe. Uniting students, universities are sort of building bridges between countries. With this in mind he addressed the audience. “The key thing we need to understand is that summer schools vary. What was relevant yesterday is obsolete today. Our task is to keep abreast with the current trends and always find opportunities for creativity,” stressed Jeroen TORENBEEK.

Program of the Week also included the Student Day, Science Day with Campus Tour, and the Day of the Russian Language. And, of course, a rich cultural program was prepared for the guests of Polytechnic University. On one of the warm May evenings, a colorful excursion took place along the rivers and canals, after which all participants unanimously agreed that St. Petersburg was a city where you would want to come again.

Representatives from the following universities and organizations took part in IPW-2019:

Program_IPW2019