Students from Mariupol State University visit St Petersburg University
At Russia’s oldest university, they have visited the museums, the Botanical Garden and the Research Park of St Petersburg University. They also learned about its training opportunities and the special features of the admission campaign.
The introduction to the University began with a sightseeing tour of the Twelve Collegia building. Employees of the St Petersburg University History Museum told the guests about the history of the foundation of St Petersburg University. They also spoke about other buildings of the University campus located in this part of Vasilyevsky Island. The students visited the Petrovsky Hall, which has remained untouched since the 18th century, and the Assembly Hall, which hosts concerts and celebrations, including graduation ceremonies. One of the students shared that he had seen it when he was watching a recording of a St Petersburg University Choir performance, and even then he had been able to appreciate the beauty of the place. The students also viewed a temporary exhibition of the St Petersburg University History Museum.
The tour of the Twelve Collegia building ended with a visit to the Mendeleev Museum and Archives, located in the former University-owned apartment where the scientist lived from 1866 to 1890 as a University professor. The students were immersed in the atmosphere in which the great scientist had worked on the Periodic Law. After the tour, they recorded their thanks in the guestbook, noting how carefully the study of the eminent chemist is preserved and how much they had learnt about his life story.
The St Petersburg University Botanical Garden welcomes summer
The student delegation then went on a tour of the University’s Botanical Garden. Its director, Aleksandr Khalling, told the students of Mariupol State University about the history of the garden and outdoor plants. The tour was not interrupted by the onset of rain: the students hid under a cypress tree and started asking about flowers and shrubs from the Japanese Garden’s flora collection − they would like to plant one of these at their university.
The students also visited the Vladimir Nabokov Museum at St Petersburg University, where the exhibition ‘The Itinerants or Another Life of Insects’ has recently opened. Project curator Anna Ratnikova presented a collection of stained glass costume jewellery and jewellery by contemporary artists. Then the guests were given a tour of the main exhibition. The visit to the Vladimir Nabokov Museum at St Petersburg University aroused the guests’ interest in the subject of the writer’s work and life. They thanked the museum staff for the absorbing tour and promised to return here again in future.
An integral part of St Petersburg University that has much to say about its activities is the University’s Research Park. It is a unique complex that is rightly considered the best in Russia and one of the world’s best free access centres.
Specialists showed the guests the capabilities of four resource centres: Biobank; the Centre for Optical and Laser Materials Research; the Centre for Molecular and Cell Technologies; and the Physics Educational Centre. As part of the guided tour, the students were able to see modern high-tech equipment and observe researchers at work.
At the end of the visit the Admissions Committee staff made a presentation to the students of Mariupol State University. During the presentation, they told the students about the research and academic potential of the University and answered all the questions concerning the admission and transfer procedures to the academic programmes of St Petersburg University.