Community

Students who come to a new country often do not know where to start, what to do first, who to turn to, and so on. In such situations, HSE University-St Petersburg and the Erasmus Student Network (ESN) help international students adapt by providing buddies. ESN is the biggest student organisation in Europe that helps students integrate into the local society better. Buddies are local student volunteers who help international students and make their life at the university easier.

China and Russia have numerous opportunities for future mutual development while respecting each other’s traditions and cultural backgrounds. These possibilities are enhanced by the Master’s programme ‘Arts and Culture Management’, which has already welcomed students from China. They shared their impressions of their studies and how they see ‘a heaven in a wild flower’ (William Blake, 1803) in St Petersburg's everyday life.

The diverse HSE University community includes people from different countries and continents who can share their cultural experiences and generate novel ideas with their never-ending creativity and love for art. The Master's programme 'Arts and Culture Management' welcomed several students from Nigeria last year. Today, they are happy to share their sources of inspiration and their expectations of the programme and their future life.

Already for six months, Ekaterina Khozyainovaа and Elizaveta Chesnokova, 2nd-year students of the Master's programme 'Arts and Culture Management', have been studying in Italy under the double-degree programme with the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart: they immerse themselves in the industry, visit cultural places of Milan (for example, the opera house La Scala), and enjoy the art. Read more about the students' thoughts and impressions in the article.

Olga Makarova is a lecturer at the School of Economics and Management, HSE University-St Petersburg. In the 90s, she was one of the lucky people who were good at Economics and foreign languages. Thanks to that, for a long time, she was working as a financial executive for such large companies as AT&T, Gillette CIS, Tele2, Pratt & Whitney. Then she transferred to the education and consulting spheres. Read about how prof Makarova started her career and what the students should make a note of in the article.

This is what Dr Manoj Sharma believes. At the beginning of this academic year, he became Vice President of HSE University-St Petersburg and has started to supervise the international activities of the campus, from the academic mobility programmes to partnerships with world universities. We spoke to him about language barriers, key tasks, and Russian peculiarities.