In the 2024-2025 academic year, Northeastern Federal University hosts the fifth season of program «Sirius.Summer»: start your project." As part of the program, student mentors work with student participants on project tasks assigned by project managers fr om among the university staff. Today, on February 3, a mentor conference was held, wh ere students presented the interim results of their work from November 2024 to the current day.

This academic year, 149 students are mentors of schoolchildren, last academic year there were 137 of them. Also, in the 2024-2025 academic year, young researchers are working with mentors on 72 projects. According to the results of the 2023-2024 academic year, NEFU ranked first among universities in terms of the number of mentors, and the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) ranked second among regions in terms of the number of schoolchildren and students involved in this program. In 2024, the total amount of funding for scientific and technological projects amounted to about 18 million rubles. There is an increase in research carried out in humanitarian and social areas.

As Ninel Malysheva, Director of the NEFU Department of Science and Innovation, noted, this year the national project «»Science and Universities» was completed, thanks to which youth scientific laboratories were opened at the university. Part of the activities of the completed national project has been included in the new one – «Youth and Children». «New competitions for the creation of youth scientific laboratories will start in June 2025. One of the conditions is the participation of students as employees – at least 30% of the team must be students of the university, on the basis of which new scientific departments are being opened. Therefore, when making applications, we will involve those students who have performed well within the framework of the federal program «Sirius.Summer», she commented.

In order to expand the number of students, participants involved in project activities, Alexandra Yakovleva, Vice-rector of the Minor Academy of Sciences of Yakutia, proposed including the program in the activities of the Northeastern University Educational District Association. In her opinion, this will help to involve even more schoolchildren in project activities, unlock their potential, which, in turn, will have a positive impact on the quality of projects being implemented.

The All-Russian educational program «Sirius.Summer»: «Start your Project» has been implemented since May 2020 and was supported by the instruction of the President of the Russian Federation. The program is aimed at involving schoolchildren in solving project tasks related to current issues of science, technology and business. The students' project work is carried out under the guidance of a mentor who helps them understand the task and accompanies the student throughout the project.

The basic university of program «Sirius.Summer»: «start your project» in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) is NEFU, and the regional coordinator is the Small Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia)