Software engineers: IT specialists who can do anything

Every year, about 200 students come to the Higher School of Economics to study software engineering. In four years in a bachelor's degree, someone leaves the race, but those who get to the finish line become universal IT specialists who know the whole kitchen of creating projects from the inside: from writing code and design to legal subtleties and GOSTs. The program manager Valeriy Shilov and the students of Software Engineering talk about how the training of specialists who can do anything is arranged.  

From programming to patent law 

“When I entered, I didn’t know what software engineering was - I went to the program with the most beautiful name and the highest passing score in Russia (in 2018 the passing score was 296 here),” says a former student of the department Ekaterina Beresneva, who is now studies in the same magistracy and teaches herself computer engineers.

A lot of students who do not fully understand what is hidden behind the impressive name come to the first year. “Parents of schoolchildren ask me:“ What is software engineering? Is this programming? ”. Including programming, but a software engineer is not only engaged in programming. He deals with all stages of product production, ”explains the academic director of the program Valery Shilov.

However, it all starts with programming and learning a lot of languages. If basic C #, Java, C ++ and Python are missing, there are electives where you can take others, for example, Swift or Kotlin. Knowledge is reinforced by experience: from the second year practice begins, including in large companies, and project work starts. As they study the material, students take all stages of creating a project into their own hands: they are engaged in design, copyright issues, monitor compliance with GOSTs, prepare documentation. Sometimes you have to conduct formal negotiations. For example, a fourth-year student Alexander Plesovskikh is developing a pass application using NFC technology as a graduation project. The problem is that Apple is extremely reluctant to provide access to this technology on its devices,