A three-year collaboration program for the development of a graduate level research university was signed last week in Moscow by MIT President Susan Hockfield and Skolkovo Foundation President Viktor Vekselberg. The new institution will be located in Skolkovo, the state sponsored innovation hub under completion near Moscow.
The university, named Skolkovo Institute for Science and Technology, or SkTech, will open its doors next year for its first 20 students and is planned to consist of 15 research centers for 1,200 graduate, 300 postgraduate students and 200 faculty members by 2014. MIT Professor of Engineering Edward Crawley has been appointed president of the institute.
“I view this as a startup – we don’t just teach innovation, we do it; we are innovating the educational domain,” Crawley said in an exchange with Russia Today. “In the next year, we are going to start an educational program by attracting 20 of the most innovative students in Russia, a research program by giving grants to at least three research centers, and an innovation and entrepreneurship program. It’s about developing science and moving it as quickly as possible toward new goods and services.”
SkTech’s educational and research activities will include multidisciplinary projects in collaboration with major academic institutions in five priority areas: energy science, biomedical science, information science, space and nuclear science.
Among SkTech’s major components will be a Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, described as “an integral structure to foster and link research and education with innovation and entrepreneurship”. The Center will also offer a framework to capture and commercialize value arising from research.
In 2009, MIT’s Sloan School of Management launched an MBA partnership with the Skolkovo business school, featuring project-based courses led by the Sloan faculty.
Sources: MIT, Skolkovo Foundation, SkTech
