The 21st century, which is traditionally perceived as the age of information society, sees the human capital in the lead of major developments, a prominent Russian-Armenian businessmen and philanthropist has said, stressing the importance of developing the human capital.
In an interview with the Russian news agency TASS, Ruben Vardanyan, a co-founder of the Russian school of management Skolkovo and a founding partner of the UWC Dilijan College, highlighted the high demand for education as a major tool for keeping abreast of technological developments.
“Russia’s loss in the 1990s was not just the several millions of [US] Dollars taken out of the country. The worst thing was the trillions of [US] Dollars’ worth brain drain. [Many] emigrated to Israel, US, Europe, South Korea … That’s probably the most awesome calamity. It is, after all, 3.5% of creative people that make for progress. So the most serious struggle is for them.”
Vardanyan said they came up with the idea of creating competitive educational institutions against the youth’s increasing demand for seeking educational opportunities in the West.

 

“We consider the demand for a new format of education,” he said, adding that their methods focus also on developing flexibility and ability to understand cross-cultural differences in the younger generation.
“We have children from 72 countries in our school of Dilijan. I don’t mean the local Armenians or those from the Diaspora; [there are also students] from Europe, America[s], Australia and African countries … In collaboration with our partners from Skkolkovo, we have created a business schools for foreigners. We are proud that the UWC Dilijan school project was honored with international awards as the best public facility in Europe, and architectural trend,” he added.

 

Vardanyan said he is optimistic about the project’s promising future.

 

“We are obliged to leave behind a better planet [to the next generations],” said the businessman, expressing hope that the generation change in the two decades to come will largely contribute to the expected progress,
“We are in for major changes in the mid-2020s. That will be a change of the elite raised in the USSR,” he added.