Moscow State University

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Lomonosov Moscow State University
Московский государственный университет имени М. В. Ломоносова
Coat of arms of the Lomonosov State University of Moscow
Motto	Наука есть ясное познание истины, просвещение разума
Motto in English	Science is the clear learning of truth and enlightenment of the mind
Established
Type	Public
Rector	Viktor Sadovnichiy
Academic staff	5,000
Students	47,000
Undergraduates	40,000
Postgraduates	7,000
Location	Moscow, Russia
Campus	· Urban
Affiliations	Association of Professional Schools of International Affairs Institutional Network of the Universities from the Capitals of Europe International Forum of Public Universities
Website	www.msu.ru

Moscow State University Main Building
МГУ главное здание
General information
Location	Moscow, Russia
Coordinates	55.703935°N 37.52867°ECoordinates: 55.703935°N 37.52867°E
Estimated completion
Height
Architectural	240 m (787 ft)
Top floor	214 m (702 ft)
Technical details
Floor count
Floor area	1,000,000 m2(10,763,910.417 sq ft)

Lomonosov Moscow State University (MSU; Russian: Московский государственный университет имени М. В. Ломоносова) is a coeducational and public research university located in Moscow, Russia. It was founded on January 25, 1755 by Mikhail Lomonosov. MSU was renamed after Lomonosov in 1940 and was then known as Lomonosov University. It also claims to house the tallest educational building in the world.[2] Its current rector is Viktor Sadovnichiy.

History

The Principal Medicine Store building on Red Square, which was home to Moscow University from 1755–1787

Main buildings of the university in Mokhovaya Street, 1798

The establishment of the university was at the initiative^[clarification needed^] of Ivan Shuvalov and Mikhail Lomonosov.Russian Empress Elizabeth decreed its creation on January 25 [O.S. January 12] 1755. The first lectures were held on April 26. January 25 is still celebrated as Students' Day in Russia.

St. Petersburg State University and Moscow State University have a friendly argument about which is actually Russia's oldest. While Moscow State University was established in 1755, its St. Petersburg competitor has been in continuous operation as a "university" since 1819, and claims to be the successor of the university established on January 24, 1724, by a decree of Peter the Great.

Originally located in the Principal Medicine Store on Red Square, the university was transferred by Catherine the Great to a Neoclassical building on the other side of Mokhovaya Street. This main building was constructed between 1782 and 1793 in the Neo-Palladian style, designed by Matvei Kazakov, and rebuilt after the 1812 Fire of Moscow by Domenico Giliardi.

In the 18th century, the university had three departments: philosophy, medicine, and law. A preparatory college was affiliated with the university before it was abolished in 1812. In 1779, Mikhail Kheraskov founded a boarding school for noblemen (Благородный пансион), which was transformed into a gymnasium for the Russian nobility in 1830. The university press, run by Nikolay Novikov in the 1780s, published the most popular newspaper in Imperial Russia —Moskovskie Vedomosti.

Today, the Old Building houses the department of Oriental studies

In 1804, medical education was split into clinical (therapy), surgical, and obstetrics faculties. In 1884–1897, the Department of Medicine, supported by private donations, City Hall, and the national government, built an extensive, 1.6 kilometer long, state-of-the-art medical campus in Devichye Pole, between the Garden Ring and Novodevichy Convent. It was designed by Konstantin Bykovsky, with university doctors like Nikolay Sklifosovskiy and Fyodor Erismann acting as consultants. The campus, and medical education in general, were separated from the university in 1918. Devichye Pole is now operated by the independent Moscow Medical Academy and various other state and private institutions.

After the October Revolution in 1917, the school began admitting proletariat and peasant children. In 1919, tuition fees were abolished, and a preparatory facility was established to help working class children prepare for entrance exams. During the implementation of Joseph Stalin's First Five-Year Plan (1928–1932), parts of the university were constructed by prisoners of the Gulag.

The First Humanities Building

After 1991, nine new faculties were established. In 1992, the university was granted a unique status: it is funded directly from the state budget (bypassing the Ministry of Education), which provides a significant level of independence.

Campus

Building of the Faculties of Biology and of Soil Science

Since 1953, most of the faculties have been situated on Sparrow Hills, in the southwest of Moscow, 5km from the city center. The main building was designed by architect Lev Vladimirovich Rudnev. In the post-war era, Joseph Stalin ordered seven huge tiered neoclassic towers to be built around the city. It was built using Gulagor labour, as were many of Stalin's Great Construction Projects in Russia.[6] Located on Moscow's outskirts at the time of its construction, the location of the main building is now about half-way between the center of Moscow at the Kremlin and the city's current limits. The Journalism Department now occupies the university's original location in downtown Moscow across from the Manezh, steps from the Kremlin and other government buildings.

The MSU main building was the tallest building in the world outside of New York City at the time of its construction, and remained the tallest building in Europe until 1990. The central tower is 240 m tall, 36 stories high, and flanked by four huge wings of student and faculty accommodations. It is said to contain a total of 33 kilometers of corridors and 5,000 rooms.

The university library

Facilities available inside the building include a concert hall, a theater, a museum, administrative services, a library, a swimming pool, a police station, a post office, a laundry, a hairdresser's salon, several canteens, bank offices and ATMs, shops, cafeterias, a bomb shelter, etc. Along with the university administration, the Museum of Earth Sciences and four of the main faculties – Faculty of Mechanics and Mathematics, the Faculty of Geology, the Faculty of Geography, and the Faculty of Fine and Performing Arts – now reside in the Main building. The star on the top of the tower is large enough to include a small room and a viewing platform; it weighs 12 tons. The building's facades are ornamented with giant clocks, barometers, thermometers, statues, carved wheat sheaves, and Soviet crests. It stands before a terrace featuring statues of male and female students gazing optimistically and confidently into the future.

While the Sparrow Hills were on the outskirts of the city at the time of the construction of the main building, they are now about halfway from the Kremlin to the city limits. Several other buildings and sports facilities were later added to the campus, including the only baseball stadium in Russia. Currently, a new building is under construction for the social sciences faculties, and another new one of vast size has just been built for the library, which is the second-largest in Russia by volume (number of books). The university also has several dormitory buildings in the Southwest of Moscow, outside the campus.

The historical building on Mokhovaya Street now mainly houses the Faculty of Journalism, the Faculty of Psychology, andThe Institute of Asian and African Studies. The university includes a number of faculty buildings located near Manege Square in the center of Moscow and a number of campuses abroad in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

The university's main library is one of the largest in Russia. Current estimates suggest that it contains approximately 9,000,000 volumes. The library serves in the area of 55,000 readers per year, using approximately 5,500,000 books.

Faculties

As of September 2009, the university has 39 faculties and 15 research centres. A number of small faculties have been opened recently, such as Faculty of Physics and Chemistry and Higher School of Television. Evening classes are conducted by the Faculties of Economics, History, Journalism, Philology, Psychology and Sociology while the Faculty of Journalism offers a correspondence degree program. Here is the full list of faculties, according to the official web-site:

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