Six more universities have joined Russia’s Project 5-100, an initiative created to get five of the country’s universities into the top 100 global rankings.
Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University, Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University, Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia, Siberian Federal University, University of Tyumen and South Ural State University, have all been recently accepted into the project, which currently comprises of 15 universities.
“We are going to provide special support measures for these institutions outside the framework of the Project”
The six new institutions were chosen from 18 who participated in the final stage of the selection, which was then narrowed down to 10 in the second round.
The universities had to present their academic excellence programmes which were then discussed by those judging.
The successful participants were selected by the Council on Competitiveness Enhancement of Leading Russian Universities among Global Research and Education Centers, set up to oversee further development of leading universities in the country.
Chairman of the council and Russian Minister for Education and Science, Dmitry Livanov, said that they were also especially impressed by the universities which were admitted into the second round but not into the final six: MAI, Perm National Research Polytechnic University, Saratov State University and Southern Federal University.
“Despite the fact that these four universities were not selected for Project 5-100, we are going to provide special support measures for these institutions outside the framework of the Project,” said Livanov.
Since the project began, more than 250 joint educational programmes with foreign partners have been launched.
There has also been a rise in international with some of the participating universities seeing the number of international students reaching a proportion of 20% of the student body.
Project 5-100, which was set up in 2013, is hoping to see five universities in the top 100 global rankings in Times Higher Education World University Rankings, QS World University Rankings and Academic Rankings of World Universities.
The deadline for the goal was set for 2020, however there are discussions that it may be extended beyond this to 2035.
