Novosibirsk State Technical University has confirmed the status of the flagship university of Novosibirsk region and received 64 million rubles for the development.
The letter informing about the decision of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation to subsidy NSTU arrived on November 20, 2018.
The university was in the first group of flagship universities to receive 63.96 million rubles from the federal budget. The money expenditure is supposed to meet the objectives of the NSTU strategic development. The equipment for teaching and research purposes, software, access to scientific journals and other electronic resources will be purchased with the money.
Business trips for young scientists also will be sponsored, so that they could take part in major conferences and visit leading world scientific centers. The Federal Grant will be used for improving the quality of research publications as well: the university administration will stimulate researchers for publishing in internationally recognised scientific journals. This will also help to improve the university positions in the international university ranking.
"Money could be either ‘eaten away’ or spent on the strategic development. In 2007/2008, when NSTU received 600 million rubles through the "Innovative Educational Program" federal project, we didn't waste it like some other universities. Almost all of the money we spent on buying new research equipment and overseas training for specialists. As a result we achieved a significant outcome: the growth of the number of publications in the leading journals, contracts for research and development", — the NSTU Rector Anatoly Bataev says.
The Flagship universities program was initiated in Russia in 2016. A flagship university is supposed to be the driver of the economic and social development of its region: develop products, technologies and train specialists for an economic breakthrough in the respective constituent entity. The flagship university of Novosibirsk region is NSTU. Overall there are 33 flagship universities in Russia. Besides NSTU, there are 5 flagship universities in Siberia: Altai State University, Kemerovo State University, Omsk State Technical University, Siberian State Medical University in Tomsk and Siberian State Aerospace University in Krasnoyarsk.