In February 2020, the Winter School of History Faculties of Chelyabinsk universities started. Head of the Department of Russian and International History at the Institute of Media, Social Sciences and Humanities of South Ural State University Olga Nikonova told Chelyabinsk students about Master's programmes and conducted a master class on the design of historical research.
The Winter School of History Faculties is an event that is held in Chelyabinsk for the first time. The idea was born simultaneously with several representatives of the historical community of our city and combined three historical faculties of three universities during its preparation and holding. Head of the Department of Russian and International History Olga Nikonova spoke about the idea of the event and about her master class:
"Despite the fact that universities, as it usually seems, should compete with each other, we decided to unite at this event and present our Master's programmes, to conduct our presentations and master classes in an interesting interactive form. It is important for us to give students the opportunity to test their strengths in the design of historical research, to think through a scientific problem, to write a research plan, that is, to feel like real researchers, which requires studying for a Master's degree."
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At the presentation of Master's programmes, the representatives of universities spoke about the history majors. The SUSU Master's programme, which offers history teaching in a design form, has no analogues in the city. Over two years of study, each Master's degree student participates in the development and launch of a real project on applied history. Currently, SUSU Master's degree students are working on the development of the website entitled Historical Reconstruction of the City of Chelyabinsk, which in terms of its complexity will exceed all available digitalization products of urban history. The SUSU Department of Russian and International History also plans to launch a project on creation of a museum of porcelain.
At the master class, Olga Nikonova explored the topic of research design, talked about what a scientific problem is, why it is so difficult to find it in the “scientific jungle”, and suggested the easiest way to go through all this in the process of scientific growth. Research design is a new concept that came to us from sociology and economics, implying a scientist’s concept and strategy from the moment of searching for a problem to obtaining a finished scientific product.
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Bachelor's degree student Anastasiia Danilova told why she decided to take part in the Winter School of History Faculties, and what she sees herself as in the future:
"I decided to take part in the winter school in order to communicate with people in the group, personally get to know other students of History faculties, get to know each other, get to know their ideas and share mine. If to consider the profession of a historian, then I don’t see myself as a historian, but I do see myself as a teacher. I would like to teach history to children at school in an interesting and detailed way to kindle their interest."
The final stage of the Winter School of History Faculties was the presentation of the final group project of historical research, the design of which was born at the master classes of the school.