HELSINKI, Finland - The Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology has struck up a student exchange program with Aalto University in Finland, Skoltech vice president Alexei Sitnikov told sk.ru.
The agreement between the two innovation-based universities was struck at Slush, Europe’s biggest startup conference, in Helsinki this week.
“We’ve agreed to do short student exchanges of their master’s students with ours,” Sitnikov told sk.ru. “We have also reached an agreement to send a group from Skoltech to Aalto University in order to better understand the work of the university, which is very similar to ours by its organizational structure,” he added.
Aalto University opened in 2010, a matter of months before Skoltech began its operations. Both universities have innovation as a core philosophy.
Sitnikov said the institutions would also exchange their methods of assessment as to the effectiveness of innovation-related activities.
“The Finns have a broad innovations study program, and this year more than 2,000 people have been through this program,” Sitnikov noted. “Our scale is a little more modest at the moment. Maybe we can transfer some Finnish courses to teach our students.”
Skoltech has a student delegation at Slush, which brings together 14,000 investors, startups, media and guests.
“We have students with their projects that have, perhaps, still not reached the level of Slush,” Sitnikov said. “Simply because many haven’t incorporated yet, although we do have a lot of students with their own companies already.”
“For the students it’s feeling the spirit of Slush that’s important – how people interact, how you network. The experience is invaluable. You can only find it at such events as Slush, or our Startup Village,” he said.
Skoltech is the educational arm of the Skolkovo project, an effort by the Russian government and private investors to modernize the natural resources-based economy and refocus it on innovations.
The Skoltech building is due to open at the Skolkovo Innovation Center next year.