Society News at HSE University

HSE University graduates and the Nochlezhka charity organisation have launched a social media project called ‘Gde-to ryadom’ (‘Somewhere Nearby’) about volunteering to help homeless people. The project offers a look at volunteer work from various perspectives through personal stories, expert opinions, and interactive cases.

The Double Planet Theory, a film directed by fourth-year HSE Art and Design School student Savely Osadchy, is on the list of the main Short Film Competition at the Moscow International Film Festival (MIFF). The festival runs from August 26 to September 2 and features more than 230 films from 65 countries. Only two Russian films are taking part in the Short Film Competition.

Russia’s largest bank is no longer a bank, but a whole ecosystem of products and services—all made possible thanks to the work of the Sber AI Transformation Centre. In this interview with Success Builder, Nikita Khudov— HSE University ICEF graduate and Sber AI Transformation Centre Executive Director—explains how artificial intelligence works for us, how sports help with work, and how earning two university degrees is useful in work.

As adept at mathematics as HSE MIEM graduate and Twin3D Chief Engineer Nikita Zimenko was, he turned out to be even more inquisitive, with the result that he fell out of love with math and set his sights on digital technologies instead. In this interview with Success Builder, he explained how to conduct research on astromechanics, what 3D animators do with the human body and whether metaverses have a future.

Katya Melnikhova, a graduate of the HSE master’s programme in Psychology, is convinced that it is necessary to create an educational environment for children in which everyone can succeed. She and her husband head the Kavardak art residence programme that is based on the principle of democratic education. What does this mean? How does a background in psychology translate to coaching? How to raise a person to be happy? In an interview with Success Builder, Ms Melnikhova spoke about this and more.

Associate Professor Kirill Puzanov of the HSE Vysokovsky Graduate School of Urbanism and HSE University Professor Oleg Baevskiy have held lectures at the Red Square Book festival. They talked about perceptions of the city, its private and public aspects, chamber and representative spaces, and imaginary (or ‘vernacular’) areas. The open lectures took place as part of the HSE University Open to the City project.

Mariam Margaryan, a graduate of the HSE University Economics and Statistics programme, HSE University lecturer, and the Fundraising Director of the Friends Foundation, says that she got into philanthropy by accident. As a student of the HSE Faculty of Economic Sciences, she planned to forge a career in a large consulting company. She spoke of her path to NGOs, her favourite social projects and her work at the University in an interview with the HSE University Project-Based Learning Laboratory of Economic Journalism.

Georgy Pashchenko, a graduate of the HSE School of Finance, was not afraid to leave his career in a large company and move to the EdTech startup Kodland that HSE ICEF graduates had founded. In 2022, Kodland raised $9 million in investment from a group of funds, including Baring Vostok, as reported by Forbes. In this interview with Success Builder, Mr Pashchenko shared how his HSE studies helped him solve real-world challenges at work and why EdTech is an extremely promising field.