The competitive selection, which took place from June 5 to July 18, was aimed at forming a team of experts from among representatives of universities participating in the Priority 2030 program and scientific organizations.

"Cross-university expertise should become an important tool for identifying and translating the best practices of professional external evaluation of universities," said Dmitry Afanasyev, Deputy Minister of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation.

For the first time, the assessment of universities will be carried out by the professional community — selected experts from among representatives of universities and scientific organizations will conduct a mutual analysis of the development prospects of participants in the Priority 2030 program.

The experts included two representatives of the Southern Federal University: Maxim Bondarev, Acting Vice-Rector for International and Project Activities at SFedU, and Ruslan Denisov, Head of the SFedU Science Center. Earlier, Evgeny Mukhanov, Acting Vice Rector for Strategic Development and Research, became an expert from the Southern Federal University.

"The cross-university examination format will give universities the opportunity to receive constructive feedback from colleagues who have diverse but relevant experience. In fact, a new paradigm of mutual assessment is being formed — not of the current state (existing procedures do a good job of this), but of the university's development prospects. This is a more complex, subtle, but also more valuable expertise, which, among other things, will allow "naturally" improving the quality of processes in universities, and therefore achieving better results in the higher education system as a whole," emphasizes Andrei Volkov, scientific director of the Priority 2030 program.

The new assessment format will allow for a professional analysis of university development, create a system for exchanging best practices, and strengthen cooperation between universities.

For more information, visit the website of the Sociocenter.

For reference: The Russian Ministry of Education and Science has been implementing the Priority 2030 program since 2021. Since 2025, the program has become part of the federal project "Universities for a Generation of Leaders" of the national project "Youth and Children".