An outstanding event took place at Lviv Polytechnic on September 10 – five reconstructed and equipped with modern equipment training laboratories were opened at the Institute of Chemistry and Chemical Technologies. This became possible due to a charity project from Roshen Confectionery Corporation, which lasted more than a year.
– First of all, I would like to express my gratitude to Roshen Corporation for what it does for our University. This assistance is aimed at ensuring that students receive a quality education, become good professionals and be able to get the best possible job. Graduates must be able to work with the latest equipment. And from now on our students will have the opportunity to acquire the most progressive knowledge. In total, our partners have spent over 16 million hryvnias on the implementation of the project, which had several stages, said University Rector Yurii Bobalo. In the end, our efforts are yielding good results. Recently Times Higher Education rankings for 2021 appeared. Among 1,500 universities from 93 countries, only 9 are Ukrainian higher education institutions. In the category 501–600 Lviv Polytechnic is one of only two HEIs of Ukraine, which are included in this category.
Volodymyr Yarandin, Technical Director of Roshen Confectionery Corporation, emphasized in his speech:
– The company’s philosophy is to support and develop the educational process, starting with schools and ending with higher education institutions. We work with schools, medical institutions, and a year ago we decided to find the universities we can work with to raise the general level of knowledge of graduates in Ukraine. Thus, last year in September we started the project with Lviv Polytechnic. During this time, we have reconstructed and renovated 5 laboratories to the level of typical laboratories in European universities. We knew what was needed, and also communicated with the University specialists and thus prepared the terms of reference for the reconstruction. Implementing the various stages of this project, namely the provision of scholarships and surcharges, a series of lectures by foreign academics (due to quarantine restrictions we were forced to postpone them), we saw the effectiveness of what we do, and highlighted what needs to be considered to develop further. We plan to cooperate next year as well. We also have ideas that we will discuss, extending the cooperation for another two or three years.
From the beginning of the academic year, chemistry students will study in all these laboratories – this is one of the main terms of Roshen Corporation.
– We are convinced that cooperation must be mutually beneficial. Therefore, we are already carrying out research that will be useful for our partners. I hope that one of them – the development of technology for receiving products from biodegradable polylactides will be completed and introduced into production. This project is very important in terms of recycling plastic waste and packaging materials. If we manage to realize this, Roshen Corporation will be the first in Ukraine and one of the first in Europe to switch to the use of such materials, said the Director of ICCT Volodymyr Skorokhoda.
