INEER/ICEE-ISC Secretariat
waung@ineer.org
June 3, 2001
Donetsk State Technical University (DonSTU), a leading institution for engineering education in the eastern region of Ukraine, capped its weeks-long 80th anniversary celebration with festivities on May 29 - June 3, 2001 that included an international education meeting, concerts, and other activities.
The celebration began in April with a series of faculty and students’ scientific conferences, and ceremonial events involving faculty and students.
Delegates from several countries attended the international education meeting on June 1, 2001. Opening the education meeting Prof. O. Minayev, Rector of DonSTU and a member of ICEE-ISC, presented a paper outlining the strategic directions for engineering education at DonSTU.
Also, speaking was V. Roubicek, Rector, VSB Technical University of Ostrava, Czech Republic, focusing on the implications of the Bologna Declaration on engineering education at his institution.
Win Aung gave a talk based on a paper by Aung and Farana, concerning iNEER and ICEE.
A concert and Rector’s reception followed in the ornate Donetsk City Opera House. Staged with a mix of choir and chamber music and dance numbers, the delightful cultural afternoon was highlighted by a masterfully executed interpretation of Polovtsian Dances from the Alexander Borodin melodic opera, Prince Igor, by members of the Donetsk City Opera Dance Company.
(Honored around the world today as a leading composer of Russian national music, Borodin was trained as a doctor in universities in Russia, Germany and Italy. He became affiliated with the Academy of Medicine and Chemistry and the Military Medicine Academy, both in St. Petersburg. Music was a part-time pursuit for him as, at the age of 31, he was appointed a chaired professor of chemistry and later a vice-rector. He was noted for having established the first higher education program in medicine in Russia for women. Borodin led a hectic life ruled by what would be called ”multi-tasking” in today’s networked world, to the extent that music composition was merely a sideline squeezed into his chaotic schedule. Once his friends gave him an ashtray shaped like a tortoise because it took him as much as seven years to finish a musical composition.)
That evening, cheering students, their family and friends packed a 4,000-seat in-door sports stadium as their favorite bands played at a rock concert in downtown Donetsk.
All events were opened and anchored, in part, by Prof. Minayev, who was clearly very popular with faculty and students.
On Sunday June 3, international guests were observers at the special Pentecostal celebration (”Troytsa”) held at the famed Monastery of Holy Assumption (”Svyatogorsky Svyatouspensky Monastyr”) in the Holy Mountain three hours north of Donetsk.
To access their respective papers, click on Minayev, or Roubicek, or Aung and Farana. To view photos for the 80th celebration, click here.