HSE St Petersburg Brings Russian Language and Culture to Hanoi

On November 23-27, 2017 HSE University Saint Petersburg team of Associate Professor Nina Grigoreva and Ekaterina Starikova from the Department of African and Asian Studies, Associate Professor Irina Shchemeleva, chair of the Department of Foreign Languages and Konstantin Platonov, director of the Centre for International Cooperation went to Hanoi, Vietnam within the project 'Dialogue of Cultures: Russia and Asia-Pacific Countries'. The visit was organized by the Russian Center for Science and Culture in Hanoi (RCSC).

This project is implemented under the Federal Programme 'Russian Language 2016-2020' and supported by the Ministry of Education and Science of Russia. The core idea behind it is to offer students around the globe a cultural insight on contemporary Russia, to promote Russian Higher Education, Russian language and Russian culture. During this tour to Hanoi our faculty participated in a conference co-organized by RCSC and the Vietnam National University in Hanoi and delivered a series of guest lectures on Contemporary Russia, Russian Higher Education and the ties between Russia and Vietnam to roughly 200 students of several high schools. This time our team visited Yen Hoa High School, Chu Van An High School and Vinschool, one of the largest private high schools in Hanoi. 

On November 23, 2017 a lecture and a master-class in Russian as a foreign language took place at the Foreign Trade University for the students of FTU Russian Language Department. HSE and FTU are partner universities, and an additional student exchange agreement between FTU and HSE – Saint Petersburg was signed during this visit on November 24. Annually, around 30 FTU students choose to learn Russian as their foreign language, and we hope to welcome these students at our campus on exchange. From the other side, this agreement opens up rich opportunities for language internships to our students of Asian and African Studies who learn Vietnamese language.

On November 24, 2017 Konstantin Platonov paid a site visit to the Rang Dong Light Source and Vacuum Flask JSC, one of the largest manufacturing companies in the region and one of the Forbes Top-50 listed companies of Vietnam. Rang Dong Company has a very strong partnership with FTU – the latter is providing a research-based change management strategy for the Company. Courtesy to the Director General Mr. Nguyen Doan Thang, Rang Dong Company kindly offered in-company internship opportunities for HSE University Saint Petersburg students who will come to FTU on exchange. 

During the meeting with Dr. Natalia Shafinskaya, Director of the Russian Center for Science and Culture (RCSC) in Hanoi on November 27, 2017 Konstantin Platonov discussed further opportunities for HSE promotion in Vietnam. Dr. Shafinskaya stressed that the local reputation of HSE is strong and its visibility in Vietnam continues to grow thank to the consequent visits, guest lectures and participation in RCSC activities and events.

It is the fourth time when a delegation from HSE St Petersburg goes to Vietnam, and it starts yielding slowly. In 2017, first cohort of full-time students from Vietnam enrolled to HSE University St Petersburg. Just two years ago we had to ask local schools and universities to host us, now we receive multiple invitations from our partners and friends to send our guest lectures to Vietnam across the year. An outstanding GDP dynamic, its population being among the youngest worldwide, their very special hospitality and friendly relation to Russians make Vietnam an amazing country and a very reliable partner. It is absolutely right that Vietnam is now among the top priority countries in HSE’s international strategy, - states Konstantin Platonov, director of the Centre for International Cooperation HSE University in St Petersburg.