“Volga News”: Ekaterina Savich - “Our students are future engineering elite of our country”

Since 2022, Samara University participates in formation of the new model of engineering education in Russia, to be implemented on the basis of the University’s Advanced Aerospace Engineering School.

What is unique in the AAES educational programs, who can become a student of the advanced school of engineering knowledge, and why representatives of leading industrial enterprises must participate in the admission commission? Ekaterina Savich, Deputy Director of Samara University’s Advanced Aerospace Engineering School, told “Volga News” readers about this.

- The University has established its Advanced Aerospace Engineering School. What is unique in this education?

“The AAES new educational programs are aimed at training specialists with meta-competencies in designing and implementing cyber-physical production systems. The key feature of these educational programs is combination of mastering IT and engineering competencies, for the purpose of training IT specialists capable of solving complex engineering tasks.

The training is mainly focused on practice. The educational programs are based on project activities throughout the entire period of studying in small project groups, within themes of the AAES scientific projects. The educational project group includes students of the AAES, a tutor, a mentor from the industrial partner company interested in results of the work carried out. This form of training will allow forming project teams in course of the educational process, and will enable the industrial partner to employ the entire team of students at once.

For implementing the proposed model, special attention is paid to formation of students’ meta-competencies, ability to communicate and work in a team, for the purpose of forming the skill of team performance of project tasks”.

- How does one become an AAES student? What knowledge and personal properties should a person who aspires to join the country’s engineering elite have?

“To become an AAES student, it is necessary, in addition to conventional admission procedures, to undergo the competitive selection process. For master’s degree programs, competitive selection is carried out after passing the entrance tests to the University, and for bachelor’s degree programs, the similar competitive selection is conducted among students who have completed 2 years of study at the University’s engineering programs.

During the selection, special attention is paid to the students’ readiness to study with great involvement in project activities, in close cooperation with our industrial partners. Therefore, in course of selecting, the motivational component is in the focus. Why does the student want to study in this particular educational program, why is (s)he worthy to study at the AAES, what career trajectory does (s)he strive to follow? These and other questions are asked by representatives of industrial partners who are part of the student-selection competition commission at the AAES, when selecting students”.

- How much are engineers in demand today? What salary can they claim? Will the AAES help in the further employment of its graduates?

“We constantly update requests from the industry for training engineering personnel. Currently, all enterprises in the country suffer from large shortage of engineering personnel. Our task is not only to train highly qualified specialists, but also to form young people’s desire for scientific and technical development of the country.

At the moment, there are various options to encourage the AAES graduates employed at our industrial partners’ enterprises. This is the increased wages, compared with graduates in other fields; it is also the option to be employed right during training, with the opportunity for having a more flexible work schedule, in order to keep up with learning; interesting options with assignment of Category II ti the employee just after graduation and various other incentives for students, are under consideration”.

- What educational programs will be recruited for this year?

“In 2024, admission to the AAES is conducted for 7 master’s degree programs. Six programs have already been taught at the School: “Artificial Intelligence and Big Data in Propulsion Engineering”, “Automation and Innovation in Designing and Manufacturing Aviation Equipment”, “System Engineering and Designing On-Board Electronic Devices”, “System Engineering and Designing Radio Engineering Devices”, “Organization of Digital Production” and “Intelligent Control Systems for the Enterprise’s Digital Infrastructure”.

Additionally, the new master’s degree network program “Aerospace Engineering and Technology”, in cooperation with Shanghai University of Transport, will be launched at the AAES this year”.

 - Will graduates of bachelor’s degree programs from other Russian universities be able to enroll in the AAES?

“Graduates of technical bachelor’s degree programs from any university may enroll in the AAES master’s degree programs. For some tracks of individual educational programs, we can also assume the interest of engineers already working at enterprises, in their further training and obtaining a master’s degree.

Only Samara University’s undergraduate students may enroll in bachelor’s degree programs, having completed 2 years of study in engineering areas”.

 - Is it true that the commission at the entrance examinations to the master’s degree programs will include industrial partners’ representatives? What is their interest, and by what criteria will they evaluate applicants?

“Yes, the mandatory condition for admission to the AAES is assessing the applicant by industrial partners.

When applying for a master’s degree program, industry representatives are part of the commission at the entrance examination stage. When applying for bachelor’s degree programs, the competition commission also includes representatives of partner companies.

One of the elements for admission to the AAES is writing a motivational letter by applicants. Our partners evaluate, first of all, not so much quality of previous training as the interest in the chosen field of study and motivation to build a career trajectory within the industry”.

 - How will the learning process take place? What new formats will be introduced?

“Within the master’s degree programs, we strive for moving away from lectures and theoretical classes as much as possible, in favor of the large amount of practices and independent work, for participating in scientific and industrial projects.

For training leaders for aerospace enterprises, the AAES educational programs include the module aimed at forming competencies of a digital engineer, including systemic thinking and analysis, system engineering of complex technological systems, digital technologies for designing engineering facilities, promising technological processes, VR/AR technologies, robotics, etc.

For the purpose of forming teams of diverse specialists aimed at jointly solving problems in the aerospace industry, the student chooses a role in the project and, with the support of the project mentor and tutor, creates the individual educational trajectory that will allow developing skills and abilities necessary for successful implementation of the project”.

- What scientific projects will the AAES students be able to participate in?”

“At the AAES, there are a large number of R&D projects, in which students can take part. Currently, we also form requests to our industrial partners for provision of technical assignments and problems that can be solved by groups of students under the guidance of mentors from the enterprise. This will allow students to immerse themselves in the environment of the enterprise, learn more about peculiar features of the work, and perhaps get a job right away.

It is planned that students will be able to choose projects through the digital career system, which is currently actively developed at Samara University”.

For reference:

Samara University’s AAES educational infrastructure

To date, the AAES includes three factories:

• Cyber-physical factory of small-sized gas-turbine engines,
• Digital factory of regional aviation and unmanned aerial vehicles,
• Cyber-physical factory of small spacecrafts.

Three laboratories:

• Laboratory of the Industrial Internet of Things;
•  Laboratory of Intelligent Enterprise Management Systems
•  Educational and Research Laboratory of Designing and Production Testing of the Payload of Small Spacecrafts for the Earth Remote Sensing

Eight interactive complexes for advanced training the engineering personnel, based on modern digital technologies:

• “System Engineering of Unmanned Aviation Systems”
• “Digital Additive Technologies”
• “VR Technologies”
•  “Robotics and Mechatronics”
• “Digital Engineering of Technological Processes”
•  “Computer Engineering and Digital Technologies”
•   “Immersive Technologies in Propulsion Engineering”
•  “Organization and Optimization of Production Processes”

In 2024, it is planned to establish and equip three more laboratories:

• Laboratory of Optical Laser Communication
• Laboratory of Electronics
•  Laboratory of Integrated Reality Technologies

Source: volga.news