Today we are launching the Ilya Segalovich Foundation. This new Yandex project bearing the name of the company’s co-founder Ilya Segalovich will support organizations and public initiatives engaged in the development of affordable high-quality education in mathematics and IT. The Foundation will also include all non-profit educational projects of Yandex.
"Today, on September 13, the birthday of Ilya Segalovich, we are announcing the Foundation that will carry his name. Ilya was passionate about what he did, genuinely loved people, and helped those who were in need. For many, he was a mentor and a role model, a teacher in the best sense of the word. Acting in the spirit of Ilya, the Foundation will focus on creating educational solutions that will improve the life of individuals, as well as society overall. Strong education gives everyone an opportunity to realize their potential and feel confident in the future," comments Elena Bunina, CEO of Yandex in Russia.
The key objectives of the Ilya Segalovich Foundation are to:
● improve access to modern education in IT and mathematics;
● develop education through open data, methods and technologies;
● support teachers and professional community;
● support projects that foster public interest in knowledge, science and culture.
In addition to developing its own projects, the Ilya Segalovich Foundation will support other organizations and public initiatives through grants. The total amount of grants available to potential recipients in 2022 is 250 million rubles ($3.5 million). The applicants will be evaluated by the Foundation's panel of experts, which includes education specialists, well-known public figures, and Yandex representatives. The members of the panel, as well as the grant programs, will be announced at the Yandex conference on education, YaC/e, on November 10.
Yandex has been developing educational projects for 15 years. Our educational effort has benefitted about 6 million people: schoolchildren, students, beginner specialists and experienced teachers. As of today, almost 2 million school children used Yandex.Textbook for their studies, more than 1,000 students have graduated from the Yandex School of Data Analysis, with over 6,500 children graduating from the Yandex Academy Lyceum, while more than 1,500 students enroll in Yandex programs at universities every year.
The Ilya Segalovich Award in Computer Science has been honoring outstanding academic achievement and research since 2019, with dozens of postgraduate students and academicians having received more than 30 million rubles ($400,000) in grants. The Ilya Segalovich Scholarship is a stipend supporting talented Computer Science students at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow.
In 2019, Yandex launched an initiative for the development of education through technology. Within its framework, the company pledged to invest 5 billion rubles ($70 million) until the end of 2023 to expand its free educational projects in Russia. This work will now continue within the Ilya Segalovich Foundation and will be reinforced with further investment.
Ilya Segalovich (1964-2013) is a co-founder and CTO of Yandex; the author of the first version of the Yandex search engine and creator of the word ‘Yandex’; co-organizer and supporter of the Maria's Children Art Rehabilitation Center for orphans and children with special needs.