HSE University Alumnus Helps Create Student Co-Working Space at MIEM

HSE University Rector Yaroslav Kuzminov and HSE alumnus Vladimir Potapov, CEO of VTB Capital Investment, have opened a student co-working space at MIEM HSE on Tallinskaya Ulitsa.

As Yaroslav Kuzminov put it at the opening ceremony, the university is starting a good tradition: all alumni can leave something to be remembered by and help create a more comfortable study environment for future generations of students.

HSE University has found a good way to collaborate with its most successful alumni, Rector Kuzminov said. ‘Unlike in many Western countries, we don’t yet have a tradition of helping universities that don’t necessarily need help. But I believe that an opportunity to create a specific project, be it a co-working space, an IT classroom, or an educational initiative, will gain popularity among our successful graduates’.

‘I am pleased that the university is expanding in my old neighbourhood—where I lived when I applied to HSE some time ago,’ said Vladimir Potapov, who graduated from the Faculty of Economics in 2003. ‘I chose MIEM not only for this reason, but because it prepares students for professions of the future. And the co-working space can serve as a “factory”, a place for networking, where the products of the future will be created.’

Yaroslav Kuzminov expressed his support of this idea. ‘We see today that co-working spaces are becoming the most popular collaboration areas for our university students, and that’s why we are going to reform up to one third of all our classrooms in this format.’

Innovation workshops and co-working areas at MIEM are necessary for student and staff joint project work. Since 2018, MIEM has developed technology-project-based learning. Vladimir Potapov, as a member of the Board of Trustees of HSE’s Outstanding Alumni Endowment and its biggest donor, actively supports the initiatives aimed at developing innovative learning at the university. At the close of the ceremony, he said, ‘As someone who has been professionally involved in investment for their whole life, I believe that the best possible investment is in education.’

Photo: HSE University/ Mikhail Dmitirev