Foreign citizens have the right to enroll in tuition-free positions through the Rossotrudnichestvo federal agency as part of a Russian Government scholarship.
Applications must be submitted before March 1 to a Rossotrudnichestvo office at a Russian Embassy/Consulate or an office of the Russian Center of Science and Culture.
Visit www.russia.study to access the submission system.
ITMO University only participates in the second selection stage. This means that the university only accepts or rejects applications that have passed Rossotrudnichestvo’s selection process.
Many CIS countries distribute their scholarships independently and collect the approved candidates’ applications and other paperwork in preparation for the second stage.
The second stage gets into full swing near the summer season, when the applications of all approved candidates are uploaded into the information system to be assessed by the universities.
In 2017, the first batch of applications was uploaded on June 1.
In its consideration of the applications, the university assesses the following:
the candidates’ current academic performance: their academic transcript with an emphasis on their average score and proficiency in the subjects relevant to their chosen area of study;
personal achievements: certificates and diplomas of recent competitions, publications, participation in conferences;
participation in various educational programs outside of the school/university curriculum.
As of now, the university does not receive information about the points acquired through Rossotrudnichestvo’s exams.
Once their application has been approved, the candidate receives an educational invitation, which allows them to be enrolled on the date of their arrival to the university (regardless of deadlines of the general admissions campaign and without additional exams).
A visa invitation should also become available in the Rossotrudnichestvo system, which the candidate can use to request a student visa at their nearest Russian Embassy/Consulate.
At the moment of enrollment, the candidate must choose an educational program from the list of programs in their chosen subject area.
In the course of their education, students enrolled on the government scholarship can only transfer between programs within the scope of their subject area.
Prospective international students have the chance to pre-qualify for admission to Bachelor's degree programs in Maths and Computer Science by taking part in ITMO University’s International Open Entrance Competitions. Prize-winners get free tuition at a wide range of ITMO University and other Russian universities Bachelor’s programs without having to go through any entrance examinations.
Both competitions are conducted in three rounds:
The preparatory training round is held online. The points earned during the training round have no effect in determining the candidates for the final round, but it gives you invaluable (and limitless, since this round has no set amount of time and attempts) opportunities to practice complex tasks of the qualifying and final competition rounds.
The qualifying round is conducted online. You have only one attempt to solve this round's tasks. Top contenders of the qualifying round will go on to compete in the final round.
The final round is conducted either on-site or online depending on your country of residence: for those participants living in countries and cities where the final round will not be held on-site, the final round will be conducted remotely. The list of winners consists of the top 25% of participants ranked by number of points.
Please register here to participate.
For the latest information on the competitions timelines and procedures, as well as the full list of topics and examples of tasks, please visit the official website of the International Open Entrance Competitions.
International academic competition Open Doors gives prospective Master’s students a unique opportunity of early enrollment in one of ITMO University’s cutting-edge Master’s programs without entrance examinations and with tuition fees covered by the Russian Federation’s state funding.
All of the competition rounds are held online, and it is open for participation to citizens of any country in the world (except Russia).
Submit your portfolio, solve competition tasks, and be the first to get admitted to ITMO University’s Master’s program of your choice!