St. Petersburg State University held a Leadership Case Championship using a CASE-IN Simulator

The first Leadership case championship was held at St. Petersburg State University of Economics. During the championship, 25 4th year students of the Department of International Business, divided into teams, solved a case study on small business development.

"The teams, immersed in an entrepreneurial atmosphere and using their knowledge of the subjects studied, were able to develop and propose their innovative ideas in just 1.5 hours during the championship"- said the Deputy Head of the Department of International Business for Scientific Activities at St. Petersburg State University Anna Kovaleva.

The championship was held on the basis of the CASE-IN Simulator, an online platform developed by the organizers of the International Engineering CASE-IN Championship, which introduces students to the activities of Russia's leading industrial companies, helps the future generation of industry professionals to understand real production processes and even decide on their future profession.

«The simulator as a platform opens up new opportunities for building a dialogue between students, teachers, experts and potential employers. The platform allows you to expand the formats of studying academic disciplines, is a platform for attracting external experts to evaluate the decisions of participants, and also reveals new directions for the development of educational materials," comments Anna Kovaleva.

The results of the efforts of 7 student teams were evaluated by an expert commission, which included representatives of St. Petersburg State University of Economics: Irina Vardanyan, Deputy Head of the Department of International Business for Academic Affairs, Anna Kovaleva, Marina Krylova, coordinator of career guidance activities, and Anna Konareva, Head of Aspetto LLC.

Director of the Innovation Development Center of St. Petersburg State University, Associate Professor of the Marketing Department of St. Petersburg State University Andrey Aleksankov I appreciated the first experience of the teams: "Students' participation in the championship should be regarded as the first stage. For a positive effect, it is necessary to arrange the following stages, where students could compete as real measures, tools, and ways to achieve any task. In a specific case – a comprehensive marketing program with real rather than generalized theoretical promotion measures should be submitted to the competition at higher stages. We will work in this direction."

The first place in the championship was taken by the team "Onigiri with bacon", which included Anastasia Efremova (captain), Anna Boldyreva , Margarita Kapulina, Anna Parshukova, Ksenia Rotaru .

The Totali Spice team lost to the leaders by 0.04 points. Artem Chichkov (captain), Veronika Gadzhimuradova , Ekaterina Shirikova  and Olga Yakimova they became the second. 

The third prize was awarded to the VZHUH team: Veronika Gerasimova (captain), Tatiana Babenko, Anna Tukman  and Polina Ignatchik.

The champions and prize-winners of the project received valuable prizes. The best developments of the championship will be considered for implementation in the business environment.

The Simulator has been used in educational activities at St. Petersburg State University of Economics since 2022. More than 50 students who tested various interactive technologies of the platform and reviewed ready-made cases of the engineering CASE-IN championship, took a fresh look at the formation of important competencies and learned how to make decisions in a short time.

"The simulator is an interesting platform with flexible possibilities for adapting to the academic and extracurricular tasks of universities,  – says Anna Kovaleva. –  The platform plays a key role in preparing students and postgraduates to participate in the championship."CASE-INWe especially appreciate the platform for the variety of interactive technologies within the framework of cases that can be used during classroom hours, as well as for independent study by students in teams in a competitive environment. In general, the Simulator expands university opportunities in line with the digitalization of universities in Russia."

In the future, St. Petersburg State University plans to expand the opportunities provided by the CASE–IN Simulator and hold championships and business games between students of different specialized universities. 

Let's add that the interactive CASE-IN Simulator platform, created on the basis of the case method in 2021 by the organizing committee of the International Engineering Championship "CASE-IN", includes more than 150 cases and solutions. These are more than 1,500 interactive technologies for different target audiences, tasks and other formats - mini-cases, tasks, role-playing games, etc. The platform contains keys to solving cases and interactive formats, an intuitive system for completing tasks, uploading solutions and peer review has been developed, statistics and a rating of participants and organizations have been built in, and educational materials and instructions for use have been developed.

The organizers of the first Case Leadership Championship would like to thank Natalia Sushcheva, Vice-Rector for Digital Development at St. Petersburg State University, Natalia Trifonova, Scientific Director of the League of Young Specialists at the International Engineering CASE-IN Championship, Head of the Department of International Business at St. Petersburg State University, Irina Vostrikova, Director of the Communications and Advertising Management Center at St. Petersburg State University, Anna Koroleva, Head of the CASE-IN Simulator project.

Registration for the new XI season of the International Engineering CASE-IN Championship is already open. on the project's website.