Not only education: the Labour Forum discusses what impact the University Clinics have on the social well-being of the population

Today, universities have several key missions. The first of them is education, i.e. transfer of knowledge to students. The second is research, which assumes that the university is a team of scientists who bridge teaching and research. More recently, an understanding of the third mission of universities, the social one, has been developed.

It is necessary to proceed from the fact that any university is not only an educational and research centre, it also participates in the development of territories and the creation of the socially significant conditions for the population, said Marina Lavrikova, Senior Vice-Rector for Academic Activities at St Petersburg University.

The third mission can focus on a range of tasks that are important for the socio-economic development of the Russian regions. For example, the St Petersburg University Strategic Plan outlines the task of promoting and developing the Russian language. This is important because the language is a factor that largely shapes our Russian society.

Marina Lavrikova, Senior Vice-Rector for Academic Activities at St Petersburg University

Maiia Rusakova, Head of the Group for the Development of Content and Methodological Approaches to Clinical Practices for Students at St Petersburg University, said that the third mission includes working with schoolchildren and helping students in socialisation, finding a job, and overcoming age-related crises and difficult life situations. Additionally, the third mission involves the implementation of the projects to benefit the city and the region, charitable activities and interaction with vulnerable segments of the population. All these tasks are being implemented at St Petersburg University, with the help of the clinics too.

In the Social Clinic, students help institutions that provide social services to families with children, the elderly, and people with disabilities. According to Aleksandr Voronov, Scientific Director of the Social Clinic, in 2021, 225 students took part in practice-oriented activities to provide services in more than 800 cases.

Additionally, students at the Social Clinic independently create and implement volunteer projects. They build teams from scratch, think over what they will do, and coordinate an event with representatives of the social institutions. In this process, we enable students to make their own decisions.

Aleksandr Voronov, Scientific Director of the Social Clinic at St Petersburg University

In the Legal Clinic at St Petersburg University, under the guidance of highly-qualified lawyers, students offer free consultations for St Petersburg residents. Viacheslav Nizamov, Director of the St Petersburg University Legal Clinic, spoke about this during the discussion. According to him, at the Legal Clinic, students help citizens from vulnerable segments of the population solve legal issues, for example, in the field of social security and consumer protection.

At the University clinics, students contribute to the well-being of the community through more than just words. This is very important, because what people in need of social services strive for is not kind words but real actions and results.

Viacheslav Nizamov, Director of the Legal Clinic at St Petersburg University

Viktoria Bazzhina, Director of the Centre for Applied Economic Research at St Petersburg University (The Economic Clinic), noted that, as part of the clinical practice, students can help not only individual citizens, but also Russian entrepreneurs. ‘Among our customers are small and medium-sized businesses that cannot afford expensive consultation services to get advice on how to develop. Sometimes they do not understand in which direction they need to continue working or they do not see the possibility of further development if some unforeseen situation occurs. We help them deal with economic issues. In future, we are planning to work with the self-employed,’ the expert said.

Nikolai Shtykov, Scientific Director of the Archival Clinic at St Petersburg University, spoke about how clinical practice can help the regions. ‘One of the first archives that began to cooperate with us within the framework of a clinical approach is the Leningrad Regional State Archive (LOGAV) in Vyborg. Together with the heads of the archive, we were contemplating what task to give the students so that they would do something useful not only for themselves and the archive, but also for society. As a result, we asked the students to analyse the possibility of the work of regional, including foreign, archives on social and legal requests from citizens. This analysis was made, and it helped LOGAV to provide information to the population,’ said Nikolai Shtykov.

At the end of the discussion, the experts discussed the possibilities for further development of St Petersburg University clinics. In particular, it was proposed to increase the number of partners in the regions in order to promote the development of St Petersburg, the Leningrad Region, and other regions of the country. The experts also proposed to develop cooperation between clinics and small innovative enterprises and divisions of St Petersburg University. According to experts, internal projects will improve the efficiency of the University.

The 6th St Petersburg International Labour Forum was held in a mixed format from 16 to 18 March 2022. The in-person part of the Labour Forum was organised at three venues: the Tauride Palace, St Petersburg University, and the Expoforum Exhibition and Convention Centre. The Forum is organised by: the Government of St Petersburg; St Petersburg University; the Inter-Parliamentary Assembly of States Members of the Commonwealth of Independent States with the support of the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of Russia; and the Federal Service for Labour and Employment.

Maiia Rusakova, Head of the Group for the Development of Content and Methodological Approaches to Clinical Practices for Students at St Petersburg University and Director of the Sociological Clinic for Applied Research, added that in future the clinics will be able to cooperate with the Career Centre at St Petersburg University. ‘This will enable students to choose an individual professional trajectory and build a career, which is also part of the third mission of the University,’ said Maiia Rusakova.