Big celebration! ICEF Held the Graduation Ceremony for Bachelor’s and Master’s Class of 2024
Hosted in HSE Cultural Center, the ceremony welcomed in its crowded hall 200+ graduates who were joined by their parents, faculty, leaders of HSE and ICEF, and guests.
Alongside the diplomas with honours, the highest performing graduates were conferred certificates of academic achievement and contribution to campus life. More than half of the bachelor’s graduates stand a good chance of graduating with First Class Honours also from the University of London (Editor’s Note: The UoL graduation ceremony takes place at a later date).
Opening the ceremony was ICEF Director Sergey Yakovlev. "You all are heroes today,” he congratulated the graduates. “You did it. You covered our demanding programmes, you did it successfully, and today is the day we celebrate your graduation.”
More than 70% of the graduating class have already decided on their career or place of further study. The popular career paths include banking, finance, IT, industry, and consulting, and the names of top employers are well known to everyone – SBER, T-Bank, Raiffeisen Bank, Credit Bank of Moscow, Big Four, and, last but not least, the Bank of Russia and the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation. The main thing is that ICEF graduates remain the preferred candidates with leading players in the industry, a fact that speaks to the quality the finance and economics training they receive here.
Also, as is the tradition, nearly half of our graduates choose to continue their studies in domestic and international master's, postgraduate and PhD programmes. The geography of places of their further study remains as wide as in previous years. The majority of this year’s class chose to do their finance-related master’s in Russia. PhD seekers have enrolled in the programmes of HSE, Moscow State University, Skoltech, and NES. Recipients of study offers from abroad, which number 50+ this year, will go to LSE, Oxford-SAID, EDHEC, INSEAD, and the top schools in Italy, Austria, and Singapore, among other countries. There are also those among the ICEF graduates who chose to pioneer the study at Korea University and Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance. Notably, our graduates continue to earn merit scholarships from multiple programmes thanks to their excellent progress in ICEF.”
Speaking next was Nikita Anisimov, Rector of HSE University. “I congratulate you on earning the degree from one of the best universities in the country, and it’s no exaggeration to say, world. My sincere congratulations to your teachers and mentors who really did their best for you to unfold your potential and talents and discover opportunity.”
The rector further expressed his congratulations to the parents. It were they who helped to make the university choice and offered support throughout the study years. “The Higher School of Economics is huge,” he said. “We are a huge family of as many as 55,000 students. We aren’t just a community, we are a world, and you are its part. You are a team. You will always be a part of our big family.”
In his congratulatory speech, Alexander Shokhin, President of the Higher School of Economics, President of the Russian Association of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, and Chairman of the ICEF Board of Trustees, emphasized: “And since I represent the Russian Association of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, I would also like to congratulate employers. There’s no doubt the top financial corporations are very lucky to have you, the highly qualified professionals, on their teams.”
As ICEF gains more recognition globally, its partnership network is expanding. This year marked the start of a double-degree programme with one of China’s best universities – SWUFE (Chengdu). Alexander Shokhin said he supported the idea of prizing the success of those first students who would graduate with three degrees – Russian, Western, and Eastern. “Who dares wins!" was his message to the graduates.
The next to congratulate the graduating class was Anatoly Aksakov, Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Financial Market: “You earned your degree from the world’s top university. Keep us proud. You are the future of this country. It is you who will bring a fresh wind to the economy and development at large.”
The degree award ceremony was followed by conferring the ICEF Students’ Choice Teaching Award 2023-24 to faculty members Andrey Dementiev, Olesya Kondrakhina, Igor Spiridonov, and Alexander Shirobokov.
Alexander Shirobokov expressed his gratitude to the graduating students by saying, “Our progress would not have happened without you. Shine bright! Commit to expanding your perspectives.” Olesya Kondrakhina, in her turn, wished the graduates to “remember that ICEF will always be with you.”
The last to speak at the graduation ceremony were ICEF master’s graduates Elena Sevastyanova and Maria Silkina, and bachelor’s graduates Stanislav Borisov and Yulia Komarova. They said their student years flew by quickly and they will always have fond memories of ICEF. The feeling shared by everyone on that day was best expressed by Stanislav Borisov: “What we gained from ICEF is not only solid knowledge, but also an invaluable experience. This is the win we share and take pride in.”