HSE’s Best Teachers of 2021 Announced

The award recognized 599 staff members as top teachers

© HSE University

The winners of the 2021 HSE Best Teachers award have been announced on the HSE University website. The final list is based on the votes of HSE students and graduates, as well as the results of the Student Research Paper Competition. In total, 599 staff members were named best teachers.

The HSE Best Teachers are selected by students in a special vote conducted as part of the Teaching Quality Assessment, and by graduates and doctoral students under the Alumni Monitoring and Doctoral Students Monitoring initiatives. Best Teacher awards are also given to the academic supervisors of students who have won the Student Research Paper Competition.

Unlike in previous years, this year’s results took into account the votes of students on intercampus courses. This is one reason why teachers of HSE minors achieved great success in the competition this year, with the number of winners among them increasing from 13 last year to 37 this year.

The award recognized 599 staff members as best teachers, including 488 teachers chosen by students, 77 chosen by alumni, and 110 academic supervisors of Student Research Paper Competition winners.

This year, 66 teachers were recognized in two separate categories, and five teachers were recognized in three separate categories: Alexandra Staruseva-Persheeva and Lyubov Tsyganova of the Faculty of Communications, Media, and Design, Evgeny Osin and Elena Tarasenko of the Faculty of Social Sciences, and Daniil Esaulov of the International College of Economics and Finance.

Vadim Radaev
HSE First Vice Rector

It’s remarkable that the HSE Best Teachers competition can combine tradition and innovation so seamlessly. The competition’s pillars of student voting, alumni voting and acknowledging the results of the Student Research Paper Competition haven’t changed since 2011, but the voting rules are regularly adjusted in response to the evolving educational process.

One of this year’s new features was the incorporation of intercampus courses—students could vote not only for teachers from their own campus, but also for those who teach intercampus courses. The fact that students took great advantage of this opportunity is encouraging.

Another new feature was voting by doctoral students who obtained master's degrees last year. They aren’t included in the Alumni Monitoring initiative, as they’re continuing their studies at the university, but this year, we asked for their opinions for the first time as part of the Doctoral Students Monitoring initiative. This is something we plan to continue doing.

The voting results for HSE University’s campuses in St. Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod and Perm will also be posted soon.