On Saturday, 20 April, the first All-Russian Competitive Qualifications Competitives was launched. It will allow students not only to declare their diploma, but also to receive feedback from experts, mentors.

The authors of the 15 best projects will fight for victory. The final will be held in Moscow in June. Bachelor ' s, Specialist and Master ' s degrees in the academic year 2023/2024 may participate in the competition.

Both individual projects and commands, up to five, are accepted. We can file an application before 22 May on the website. The competition is organized by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, a partner, the Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation, the operator of the State University of Management.

“The number of young people who want to become entrepreneurs is growing. For example, in 2023, over 240,000 entrepreneurs under 25 years of age develop their business, 20 per cent more than a year ago. There are now a set of support tools for young entrepreneurs. Among them, a grant of 500,000 roubles for the opening or development of business. Some 5,000 such grants have been awarded to the Ministry of Economic Development. Grants are also available through the Innovation and Rosmodyges Foundation. An important step in the development of youth entrepreneurship is the Statap as a diploma. The competition for us is an opportunity to see the ideas of young entrepreneurs " , noted by the Deputy Minister for Economic Development of the Russian Federation, Tatiana Ilumshnikov.

Projects are accepted at both the MVP stage (minimum viable product) and later stages of development and implementation.

The jury will include entrepreneurs, investors, representatives of government corporations and authorities. They will assess the work on the criteria of innovation, technology, uniqueness, availability of business ideas, scale.

" Higher education is a dynamic development that must meet the current demands of the economy, the labour market, socialism, so we constantly introduce new formats. The Statap competition as a diploma will enable our students to develop their potential as future entrepreneurs: as in their lives, they will have to prove the success of their business project. Besides, the guys are gonna run into competition. This would not have been possible if the same projects were presented in the traditional form of protection of the work of graduation " , the Deputy Minister of Science and Higher Education, Olga Petrov, noted.

The Startap as a Diploma programme has been implemented since 2017 and enables participants to develop a start-up and present it as a result of the State ' s completion programme.

As a result of 2023, the programme is already being implemented in 168 universities in 66 regions of the country. More than 2,800 students defended some 1,900 qualifications in the Standard for Diploma, of which 1,363 are individual and 581 are team members.

Entrepreneurial support is provided through the national project " Maloy and Secondary Entrepreneurship and support for the individual business initiative " , which was initiated by the President and supervised by the First Vice-Prime Officer, Andrei Belousov.