Name of the University: Moscow State University Graduate School of Business Admin.
Names of the students: Vsevolod Chudinov
Exchange semester: 5th Bachelor in Business Administration Semester - Fall, 2011
I GENERAL INFORMATION ABOUT THE SCHOOL
1. Describe the school and its surroundings – very short
The School is situated within the main historic Moscow State University campus, some 300
metres from the main building and a 5 minute walk to the Metro station “Universitet” The
school is one of the more modern ones at the university with key card access to the faculty
exclusive to its students and staff. The campus is on Sparrow Hills, overlooking Moscow, with
good transport links to the city centre and surrounding areas.
2. Current faculty divisions and special areas.
The faculty has Bachelor, Master and Executive Students. The degrees offered are BBA,
MSc. in Management and an MBA. There are also a number of executive courses and
various external workshops held throughout the year. The course content is broad in the
earlier years but mainly focusing on Marketing and Finance later on, much like the BBA at BI.
3. Number of students - graduate and undergraduate – number of exchange students
Roughly 120 bachelor students, and some 60 masters students. Usually around 6-8
exchange students per semester
4. Study structure
8 Semesters in the Bachelor programme, with 1 optional exchange semester. 4 semesters in
the Masters programmes again with 1 optional exchange semester.
II PRACTICAL INFORMATION
Information before you left
Received information package from the university upon arrival, although some limited earlier
information was sent by email.
No real difficulties before arriving except for some uncertainty regarding choice of courses.
The administration had some internal reshuffling before I arrived, so there were several
communication problems and the like, but I have been told by the students that this semester
was a deviation from the norm.
Visa Procedure and travel experiences
I am a Russian citizen so had no need for a visa.
Other exchange students applied for a visa before hand, received a single-entry visa and had
to renew it a couple of months into the semester. This takes a month, which can be an
inconvenience if you intend on travelling at that time. Good to find out in advance when this
will happen.
The visa process in Russia is pretty straightforward, with processing times predetermined,
with possibilities for express processing at least in the case of tourist visas for an official fee.
Not certain about the cost of the visa, but all information is available in English on the official
Russian visa website.
No problems with tickets, ordered online.
Academic Calendar
The academic year in Russia officially starts on the 1st of September. However, the first week
is usually quiet and you may find you don’t have exams until the second week or later. Last
day of classes was the 26th of December, but that was because I was taking some classes in
Russian, otherwise it would have been on the 20th. The exam period is a bit confusing in that
some exams are sat during the last lesson of the course in December, while the official exam
session is in January. I found I had to come back in January to sit one exam which I was not
permitted to take earlier.
Reception
The reception in my case was quite muted, in that I simply showed up at the faculty and
talked to the administration about what was going to be happening. However I arrived slightly
late for the official reception where the faculty took the other exchange students through life in
Moscow and various academic questions.
There were also some students responsible for helping out exchange students, but you would
find that the Russian students are generally helpful on most matters and everyone speaks
English.
Housing
I stayed with relatives when I was in Moscow, but there was housing provided for the other
exchange students within the Stalinist skyscraper that is the Main Building. This had an
amazing view of Moscow, but the décor is generally old fashioned. The rooms are double
rooms similar in configuration to the double rooms at BSN with two separate bedrooms and a
common bathroom. The difference being that the kitchen is shared with more people on the
floor.
The university provided all the housing, but there were no real alternatives suggested to the
Main Building residences.
Something to keep in mind is the fact that the residence does not permit overnight guests,
and people can only come up to the flats having filled in a permit at the Main Building
entrance, and cannot stay past 11pm. These rules are not flexible, so there is essentially no
point trying to go around them.
Costs
For most students living in the main building, the key expenses are food, drink, and housing.
Everything else can essentially be spent on your free time. There is no need to public
transport to get to the faculty, and no real need for books as very few of them are used. The
other exchange students used some 50-70% of their money on going out and travelling.
The International Office
There is no separate international office, but there is a person responsible for coordinating the
exchange scheme and who all exchange students go to for questions.
The coordinator was unhelpful at times but that had to do with the general administration
issues in that semester. It is essentially up to you to go about finding what you need. You
could be lucky and solve the issue quite quickly but you could also be kept waiting for ages. I
would advise going to the coordinator directly as she was generally free for people to come
with questions and you would eventually get then answered in this way.
Exchange promotion
There were few or no opportunities to promote the exchange programme, so I would promote
BI mainly in conversation with the various students who were considering going on exchange.
Social Activities
From the looks of things, all students seem to get along with each other, or at least there is no
classroom conflict or tension. The exchange students generally fit in quite well, and whenever
there are any social activities, there are often lots of Russian students joining in.
Given that there are more often than not, few exchange students at the university, and given
that they all stay at the same residence, they form a tight group and do most things from
weekly shopping to social events to trips together. There was no discord from my experience,
but the fact that the exchange students are not isolated from the Russian students is a big
advantage.
There are several different organizations that students are part of at the university, but they
are generally not that well advertised and have little bearing on the lives of exchange students
that they tended to pass us by.
I enjoyed my time at the university, but I think I would have enjoyed it more had I lived in the
residences, which is something I would definitely advise anyone going to MSU in the future.
Culture and Language
Being Russian myself I naturally had no language problems. Nonetheless I believe that none
of the foreign exchange students had any difficulties either. The faculty is quite international
with a large number of obligatory courses in English. This means that practically everyone in
the administration and all the students speak English.
In terms of the possibilities for experiencing the country and culture students are all obliged to
take s considerable number of hours of Basic Russian lessons which naturally helps the
understanding of both. However, beyond that it depends very much on personal initiative.
Exchange students get an introduction into Russian life when they first get there during the
induction period, but after that they are generally left to themselves. Having said that, being
based in Moscow provides a lot of opportunities. While air travel may now be somewhat
expensive with the demise of the last Russian low cost carrier, budget railway tickets are still
very much available. This means that trips to St Petersburg or the Golden Ring can be very
easy to arrange. Moscow is also a good base to see the rest of Eastern Europe. Half of the
exchange students arranged a trip to Kiev, Minsk, Vilnius, Riga and Tallinn, which are all
within easy reach of the Russian Capital.
Cultural and Social Effects from the Exchange Experience
I went to Russia as a Russian citizen never having lived there for any meaningful amount of
time in a conscious age, and I believe the experience helped me better understand the
business climate in the country, the requirements placed on graduates and not least to
improve my written Russian by taking courses in Russian.
I think the exchange experience gave me a better understanding of what is expected of me in
a Russian working environment and also provided me with an important link to the Russian
business community. I feel I am now better prepared for the challenge of working in Russia if I
was to ultimately decide to do so.
III ACADEMIC INFORMATION
The Teaching situation
The courses at the faculty are taught in Russian and English, but the choice, is much wider if
there is some prior knowledge of Russian. I would advise people who do not know Russian
from before to go to MSU in the spring semester as there are more English courses available.
In terms of the level of study, I would say that this depends very much on the course in
question, as some subjects will be quite superficial and simple, while others quite deep and
demanding. There is no definitive notion of how courses are assessed so some lecturers will
be tougher to please than others. It is difficult to compare the level of study to BI’s for one
simple reason, namely the fact that the courses at MSU almost always have lower ECTS
credits than BI, which means that while the workload is smaller for each individual subject, but
can be challenging due to the compounding effect of different courses.
The teaching can be said to be both practical and theoretical, again depending on the subject.
Master’s level courses, of which I took three, tend to be more practical, with one course
having a case competition of a real-life private equity deal as the assessment, and another
involving a full scale valuation model.
Lecturers use a mixture of cases, group work and lecture to good effect, and there is the
added incentive that practically everything done during the year counts towards your final
grade in the subject.
The workload, simply due to there being more courses to take, is probably greater at MSU,
despite the ECTS’ obtained per course being quite low.
Faculty and students are generally on good terms with one another, but with the relationship
being somewhat more formal than at BI. Nonetheless all lecturers are approachable and can
be contacted either via email or in the lecture.
The students as mentioned previously are by and large quite friendly with one another.
Required Literature
Very limited amount of reading is required for the lectures. Most of the necessary material is
contained either in the slides posted by the lecturer or in the actual lecture itself. Some
lecturers gave us books to read and then comment on as part of the assessment of the
course, but this was not strictly speaking necessary for the understanding of the subject
material.
Exams
All of the exams with the exception of 2 masters exams were written exams. However, due to
the coursework counting a large part towards the final grade, it is quite usual to go into an
exam knowing you have passed. By the same coin, no work during the year means you are
guaranteed to fail regardless of how well you do on the exam. The percentage that the exam
makes up of the final grade is usually between 100 and 20%
In order to pass the assessment the lecturer can require whatever pass grade he or she
seems fit. Some want 50% while others want 70%.
Other
Students can get access to the library if they wish, but it is practically never used at this
faculty.
There are 3 computer rooms in a relatively small building, so computer resources are quite
good. There is also free WiFi in the whole building. The faculty uses a system similar to BI’s
Itslearning platform. However, it is less sophisticated, and some lecturers don’t know how to
use it, so they send the slides and etc. directly to the students by mail.
Description of Courses
Example:
Course name:
Prereq.
Financial Markets
None
Intro to Private Equity None
Financial Infrastructure None
Investment Analysis
None
Financial Management None
Strategic Manag.
None
Regional Economics
None
International Economics None
Internet Business
None
Project Management
None
Exam
HW/Written
Case/Written
HW/Written
Case/Written
HW/Written
HW/Written
HW/Written
Written
Presentation
HW/Present.
Major at BI
Approved as
(Common/elective/extra)
Finance
Elective
Finance
Elective
Finance
Elective
Finance
Elective
Finance
Elective
Finance
Common
Finance
Common
Finance
Common
Finance
Common
Finance
Common
…………………………………………………………………………………………..
Please fill in all the courses you have taken
Names and e-mails:
Name: Vsevolod Chudinov
E-mail: vsevolod.chudinov@gmail.com