Irkutsk Region Governor Sergei Levchenko commented on creating a flagship university in the region and called the mechanical merger of universities a harmful decision. He said the agricultural academy and IrGUPS have already been preserved as departmental universities, and the medical university may also be excluded from the reform. Regional authorities are now seeking a corporate merger of ISU and Baikal State University without a forced merger and loss of autonomy.

The head of the Irkutsk Region commented on the issue of creating a flagship university in the region. According to him, the reform of the federal Ministry of Education and Science is leading to universities being mechanically merged. “This is, in my opinion, a harmful proposal that we should try to avoid. Therefore, I tried to make sure that most universities would not fall under this reform,” the governor said at the year-end press conference.
According to Sergei Levchenko, following negotiations between the government of the Irkutsk Region and the Ministry of Agriculture of the Russian Federation, the region’s agricultural academy has been retained as a departmental university, which under the terms of the competition cannot take part in creating a flagship university.
In addition, Transport Minister of the Russian Federation Maksim Sokolov confirmed that IrGUPS also remains departmental. At present, the regional government is working to ensure that the medical university also becomes departmental.
“Such narrowly specialized universities should not be caught up in the general distribution. Broadly speaking, there are two universities left — Baikal State University (formerly BSUEP — ed. note) and the classical university. Both are close in their indicators. We must understand that taking these universities and mechanically merging them in 2 months, when the timing of the competition has already become clear, is impossible,” the governor said.
At present, according to him, the regional government is addressing the issue concerning these two universities.
“We are looking for some other option so that we can create a corporate association. Not a rigid one, not a merger, not to make it so that it is under one rectorate and in fact make it exist only on paper, as is largely done today, but to do it while preserving a certain degree of autonomization, to preserve autonomous management. If such an option is found, then it will be easier for us to go down this path,” Sergei Levchenko concluded.
As a reminder, ISU has prepared an application to take part in the competition to form a flagship university. But the university is not taking part in the first round of the competition, which will end on February 1 next year, because the necessary position of the regional government has not been formed. There is also no clarity regarding the second mandatory condition for passing the selection process — merging with other higher education institutions.