New Year's greetings from Andrei Rudskoi, Rector of SPbPU

Dear friends, colleagues, students!

From the bottom of my heart I congratulate you on the coming New Year! This holiday unites all of us and gives us hope for a bright future.

The year 2024 was a special year for our university — Polytechnic University celebrated its 125th anniversary. Seven thousand guests gathered to celebrate the anniversary, including alumni of different years, friends and business partners.

Conferences and forums held at the university were dedicated to the anniversary. Special projects «Persons of the Month», «Dynasty», «This Day in SPbPU’s History», «Legends of National Science», and the discussion club «Your Word!» revealed the history and present-day life of the University in a new way.

The name of SPbPU sounded far beyond its borders. The photo exhibition «St. Petersburg Polytechnic University — 125 Years» in the ROSPHOTO Museum and Exhibition Center presented unique historical negatives and photographs of the university from the funds of the Museum of History of SPbPU. The expositions «The First Among Engineers» in the Peter and Paul Fortress, at the Moskovsky Railway Station in St. Petersburg and the Leningradsky Railway Station in Moscow told about the achievements of Polytechnic scientists. And at Pulkovo Airport, passengers saw the «Polytechnic Planet» — entertaining examples of flora and fauna of the Polytechnic Park on slides.

In honor of the anniversary, we established the «For Merit» insignia, which was awarded to many Polytechnics — distinguished professors and young teachers, heads and staff of departments, students and graduates, as well as partners of the university.

The overall success of our university is made up of dozens and hundreds of your personal achievements, dear friends. This year 13, polytechnics were among the most cited scientists in the world, 11 representatives of SPbPU won the contest «Golden Names of Higher Education». Our smart and talented undergraduate and graduate students and young scientists won presidential grants, personal scholarships, won intellectual and creative contests, sports competitions, increasing the glory of Polytechnic University. We have performed well in international rankings — we have confidently entered the top ten RAEX, Forbes, top five in Russia in almost all subject rankings in the field of engineering sciences. In the World University Ranking 2025 ranking of the British agency Times Higher Education Polytechnic University ranked fifth among Russian universities.

We have new academic and industrial partners, including foreign ones, although it is not easy to work in the international market under the current conditions.

SPbPU’s partnership with Belarusian-Russian and Russian-Armenian universities is recognized as the best practice. From 2025, Polytechnic University will coordinate the entire «Slavic project», including universities of Armenia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

Another distinction of the outgoing year is that during the admission campaign Polytechnic University was incredibly popular with applicants — the university received 145 thousand applications for admission. 12 thousand freshmen came to Polytechnic University to replace graduates — this is a record!

Caring Polytechnic students participated in charity events, collection of humanitarian aid, were blood donors.

And a natural result of that is that this year our university for the third time became the winner of the prestigious city award «Fontanka.ru — Recognition and Influence».

Last year was successful for the implementation of many major projects. We do not know what the next year will bring us, but we will continue our mission: to develop science, implement innovations important for society and train leaders who will be able to ensure economic growth and technological sovereignty of our country. We will do everything that depends on us.

Dear friends and colleagues, Happy New Year 2025! May it enter our lives with hope and goodness. May the long-awaited and beloved holidays bring peace and harmony to every home, the joy of communication with loved ones. I wish health and prosperity to each of you! Happy New Year! Merry Christmas!