Samsung Russia’s Educational and Cultural Projects Win Awards in Corporate Charity Leaders 2015

Samsung Electronics won two “Corporate Charity Leaders” awards, the eighth annual charity programs competition, for the company’s social and educational activities. The Awarding Ceremony took place at Helikon Opera, Moscow, on November 25th, 2015.

Two of the company’s projects were awarded. The Yasnaya Polyana Literary Award, co-founded by Samsung Electronics and the Leo Tolstoy Memorial Estate, won in the nomination “The Best Program Aimed at Supporting Modern Art and Culture”. A diploma for the second place in the nomination “The Best Program Contributing to the Development of Education in the Russian Federation” was given to the additional education project on IT and programming basics “SAMSUNG SMART SCHOOL.”

The annual All-Russia Corporate Charity Leaders research is a joint project of the Donors Forum, the PwC international audit and consulting firm network and the Vedomosti newspaper, which aim to support, develop and promote corporate charity ideas. The project goal is to identify the best examples of corporate charity programs and to spread the information about corporate charity in the business environment and society in general. The project consists of two parts: the corporate charity study, according to the results of which the ranking is performed, and the charity programs competition. The competition awards are given in six nominations; in total, 65 companies have participated in the competition in 2015.

“We are very happy to be highly assessed by the judges of the contest – this once again confirms that our projects have made a noticeable contribution to the development of culture and education in Russia by supporting literary talents and helping gifted students to discover their knack for technology. Samsung is a socially responsible company, and we are happy to develop our projects that benefit people. This year, we have already accepted new participants in the “SAMSUNG SMART SCHOOL” program, increased the Yasnaya Polyana award prize fund and introduced new nominations awarding the best work of a foreign author and the book chosen by the readers,” said Sergey Pevnev, Corporate Relations Department Director at Samsung Electronics CIS HQ.

The annual All-Russia Yasnaya Polyana Literary Award, founded in 2003 by the Leo Tolstoy Memorial Estate and Samsung Electronics, is one of the most prestigious and well-known literary awards in Russia. The award supports the classic Russian literature traditions. The award jury, headed by Vladimir Tolstoy (the writer’s great-great-grandson), includes well-known Russian writers, literary critics and public characters. The award is given for the best traditional form fiction work in the following nominations: “Modern Classics,” “21st Century,” “Childhood, Boyhood and Youth.” In 2015, the award was given for the first time in the “Foreign Literature” nomination, as well as in Samsung’s special nomination “Readers’ Choice.” In 2015, the total prize fund has grown substantially and is now seven million rubles.

The “SAMSUNG SMART SCHOOL” additional education program aims at helping to educate future engineering and technical personnel, assisting in occupational guidance for high school students and increasing their interest in IT innovations, which is consistent with the relevant task to develop Russian education. The program is implemented with the help of the Russian Ministry of Education and Science and regional education management units since 2014. It is designed for five years and training of over 5,000 students in more than 20 Russian regions. Within the academic year 2014 / 2015, over 1,000 high school students were educated according to the program and received advanced knowledge of IT basics as well as independent mobile app development skills on the Android platform.