Siberian Federal University

Answering the question about which specialists will be especially in demand in new geopolitical realities, in particular for the creation of previously non-existing production facilities in the country, Maksim Rumiantsev highlighted engineering areas and IT professions.

“The answer to new technological challenges, the development of manufactures and industries will inevitably be the growing popularity of engineering education. New engineering professions are characterized by a high proportion of soft-skills and enhanced digital competencies,” noted Prof. Rumiantsev. “The university is able to largely cover the growing need. There are about six thousand state-funded places at SibFU this year. Over 60% of them are engineering and IT.
Furthermore, engineering education, training of specialists to the needs of the mining and metallurgical complex is declared by the university as the M4 strategic project, which SibFU is implementing within the framework of the Priority 2030 program.”.

The speakers noted that companies are increasingly insisting on short programs. SibFU has worked out the practice of creating short-term programs under the employers’ order. The university has plans for implementing the Design of Automobile Roads and Forming Transport Infrastructure using ITS program at the request of Breeze Group which operates in 23 regions of Russia, as well as in Mongolia and Kazakhstan. Another example is the ESG-concept: Risk Assessment and Environmental Management Master’s program, which network partner is world-class Yenisey Siberia Scientific and Educational Center. The program is aimed at training specialists to solve the tasks of organizing and conducting assessments of the climatic risks of territories.

The university also commented on the readiness to respond to the demand of IT specialists.

“For the recent three years, we have been noting a steady demand for developers in the field of artificial intelligence. Last year, this trend turned into an explosive demand for IT graduates in general. Companies ask for specialists for developing and supporting mobile products, and computer and information security.”.

Specialists in automation of software product development and testing are in demand. The list of demanded specialities in the field of IT includes: web developer, mobile developer for iOS and Android, game application developer, software testing specialist, embedded systems developer, software engineer in the field of robotics and Internet of Things technologies, and so on. Separately should be listed a range of specialities in the field of data analysis and artificial intelligence technologies: data analysts and engineers, and machine learning specialists. Due to the massive transition of many processes to online, the demand for specialists in the field of data protection and cybersecurity is growing.

The rector said that in addition to the traditional specialities of the School of Space and Information Technology, SibFU opens new degree programs: Digital Law, and Biomedical Data Science (Master’s degrees).The university also launches an admission campaign for PC Games and Applications Development (Bachelor’s degree).

Training in the field of Data Science is implemented by a Minor School of Machine Learning and Data Analysis. This is a joint project of SibFU, Yandex and Ingosstrakh insurance company and is aimed at training young specialists in the field of machine learning and data analysis. The partnership combines the best of university education, online training and real business practice into the network retraining program.

The participants of the press conference agreed that the new geopolitical conditions, in particular, the termination of online educational platforms and a number of habitual digital services, cannot have a critical impact on learning.

“It was much more difficult for universities two years ago, when they had to urgently transfer education to a digital environment. But everyone coped. Now we have our own graduation thesis system, and our own online platform with training courses. There are a lot of external Russian platforms that are rapidly filling up with content and opening access to partner universities,” Prof. Rumiantsev summed up.