The students who took part in the Start-Up as a Graduation Project federal programme have presented their start-up projects the SSU Boiling Point. The participants of eight teams shared their business ideas.
Head of the SSU Business Incubator, Associate Professor of the Department of Economics Theory and National Economy Elena Korotkovskaya welcomed the audience. She spoke about the Start-Up as a Graduation Project programme and its advantages.
‘The programme helps our students not just to get a diploma, but to make an investment in their entrepreneurial abilities. They can create and register their business project, and then implement it. And it is very cool. Due to the Start-Up as a Graduation Project, we will be able to partially solve the issue of employment of graduates, because in addition to knowledge, they create a workplace for themselves and others,’ she said.
The experts who took part in the presentation of projects and shared their opinions about the developed start-ups were Director of the Centre for Business Communications Elena Mashinskaya, Senior Lecturer of the Department of Social Informatics Julia Sedavkina, entrepreneurs Roman Isayev, Sergei Korotkovskii, and Associate Professor of the Department of Materials Sciences and Technologies and Quality Management Ilya Sinyov.
The strategy game entitled Hometown Portrait became the first presented project. Its authors were second-year undergraduates of the Faculty of Psychological, Pedagogical, and Special Needs Education Lilia Sagutdinova, Irina Dvoinina, and Ekaterina Saponenko. Their project supervisor is Chair of the Department of Primary Natural and Mathematical Education Elena Morozova and Associate Professor of the same department Olga Isayeva.
According to the team, the Hometown Portrait strategy game will allow teachers and students to immerse themselves in the cultural and historical peculiarities of Saratov, get acquainted with the unique features of their native land, and create a collective model of the city.
Varvara Gembach, a student of the Faculty of Economics, presented a start-up project entitled Creating Unique Interior and Decor Items Made from Epoxy Resin. She told the audience about the V.Expo company, which would produce designer LED-lamps, panels, and paintings. The project is supervised by the Chair of the Department of Economics Theory and National Economy Elena Ogurtsova.
By the time of the presentation, several resin test samples from different manufacturers had been produced. Varvara said that a detailed study of epoxy resin production technology was underway, contacts were established with the target audience, and new test products are produced.
Another team of students of the Faculty of Psychological, Pedagogical, and Special Needs Education – Valeria Reprintseva, Alyona Galkina, and Alina Mirzoyan – presented the idea of creating a chatbot to prevent of professional burnout among young teachers. The project was developed under the supervision of Chair of the Department of Social Psychology of Education and Development Rail Shamionov, Professor of the same department Tatyana Belykh, and Associate Professor of the Department of Pedagogical Psychology and Psychodiagnostics Ivan Malyshev. It is important to note that the team also consisted of novice IT-specialists, students of the Faculty of Computer Science and Information Technologies, as well as Chair of the Department of Programming Technologies Inna Batrayeva.
The concept of the chatbot project for young teachers had already proven itself at the All-Russian Acceleration Programme. Thus, the students won in the Medicine and Healthcare nomination and were awarded the diploma of the R&D accelerator organised by the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation. And now they are waiting for funding.
Students of the Faculty of Sociology Ivan Serbin, Anastasia, Bondarenko and Artyom Kiriyenko presented the Phylum project. This is an electronic educational platform for schools, which will make learning for both schoolchildren and teachers easier. The scientific supervisor of the team is Associate Professor of the Department of Sociology of Youth Julia Semenova.
A website will be created for the educational platform, where schoolchildren, their parents, and teachers can log in. Each user, depending on their status, will have access to a certain set of functions. The development team intends to launch the platform before January 1, 2024, reach the break-even point by June 1, and achieve sustainable profit by the end of next year.
Students of the Institute of Physics Olesya Ustyanskaya and Ilya Laptik demonstrated a water catching platform that could be placed near the trunk of the plant and reduce water consumption during watering. Due to the platform, the earth will not dry out, and on hot days moisture will evaporate from the ground surface and settle on the back of the device. The scientific supervisor of the project is Chair of the Department of Innovations Elena Revzina.
Supervised by Chair of the Department of Human and Animal Physiology Oksana Semyachkina-Glushkovskaya, students of the Faculty of Biology Arina Evsyukova, Valeria Telnova, and Anna Tsven prepared a startup project entitled EEG-Electrodes for Small Animals. It is aimed at reducing the cost of experiments on the installation of electrodes on laboratory rats and mice, as well as measuring the potentials of their brain.
With the help of EEG-electrodes, it is possible to understand how the human brain works, and most importantly, to be able to assess its functional state during sleep disorders, brain and spinal cord injuries, epileptic and ischemic phenomena, psychological and emotional disorders, and other pathologies of the central nervous system.
Other teams also presented their projects. Thus, a student of the Faculty of Economics Polina Emelyanova presented a commercialised set of laboratory workshops that would be helpful for developing skills in hardware and software microcontroller systems. Her supervisor is Associate Professor of the Department of Finance and Credit Elena Chistopolskaya.
Supervised by Associate Professor of the Department of Innovations Daniil Bratashov, students of the Institute of Physics Danila Nenashev, Mikhail Averin, and Arsenii Fashchevskii presented a start-up project entitled Detection of Cerebral Blood Supply Disorders of the Injured Brain Using fNIRS- technology. The wearable and non-invasive device specialises in detecting narrowing of large vessels of the brain and predicts migraines. In the future, they plan to make sports headbands that will catch vascular spasms and inform their owner about the need to take pain medication.
At the end of the event, each team that presented their start-up projects listened to the experts, and the jury evaluation proved that the teams had passed all the stages of creating a start-up project.
According to Elena Korotkovskaya, the presentation of start-up projects will take place on the set dates in accordance with the presentation schedule in the departments.
You can find more information about the start-up projects of SSU students in the Research City section.
The Start-Up as a Graduation Project federal programme started in Russia in 2019. It serves as an alternative form of graduation paper of bachelors, specialists, and master’s degree students. Start-Up as a Graduation Project offers students to test their entrepreneurial competencies in their graduation paper and form the trajectory of a successful business. The students should understand that, in the end, they need to create not just a text which will reflect the results of their case-study, but a whole product – their own business project.
