The first Monday in September SCIT opens a new academic year. The ceremony was attended by Rector of Herzen Univesity Sergey Tarasov, Vice -Rector for International Affairs Dmitry Mereshkin, honorary guests, SCIT trainers and graduates.  Rector Tarasov addressed the new students with a word of welcome. He said, “The school forms a brotherhood of profesionals, which grows from year to year. It is wonderful, as the primary task of an interpreter is to build communication, help people to understand other people, cultures and world views. The school builds up this kind of communication very successfully, and this is the secret of its success”.  Rector Tarasov congratulated Irina Alexeeva on awarding her  the honorary title of the President of SCIT.

Director Angelique Antonova warmly welcomed the newcomers and stressed the importance of making a closely-knit community withing the group and necessity to support each other on the way. Irina Alexeeva picked up the cue saying that the School’s collective consists of unique people who can work closely with each other and thanks to this achieve remarkable results.  She hopes the new students will adopt this mode and will benefit from it.

Igor Demyanenko, Deputy Reprresentative of Russian MFA in St. Petersburg and SCIT lecturer on International Law,  spoke about his course: “I will try to persuade you that the notions and categories we use in international law are applicable in everyday life, too. We will touch upon it in our classes, and I always welcome thought-provoking questions from students”.

Kirill Kasyanov, Head of the Russian Interpretation section at UNON, joined the ceremony via Zoom.  He  congratulated the new students and described the internship opportunities at UN offices for SCIT leavers. This coming autumn, for example, UNON expects four SCIT graduates for a week-long internship. He assured everybody that Russian linguistic services are always share their professional expertise with young SCIT interpreters.

Anastasia Gavrilina, 2015 SCIT alumna and presently Reviser in the Russian Translation section at UNOG spoke about her experience of studying at SCIT and wished the new students to absorb everything that SCIt has to offer.

The meeting continued with a traditional tea-party. The new students got to know their teachers and SCIT graduates, asked questions about the treaching process and School’s traditions.