Universities As Recruitment Centers: the kremlin Forcibly Militarizes Higher Education

At least 16 universities of st. petersburg, the moscow institute of physics and technology, the higher school of economics, the bauman state technical university of moscow, the plekhanov russian university of economics, and dozens of regional colleges are participating in a centralized campaign by the ministry of defence of the rf to recruit students for the war in Ukraine. Students are promised up to 5.5 million rubles “for a year”, a return to their studies, and “service in the ‘unmanned’ forces and not on the front lines”.

In January 2026, the ministry of defence of the rf sent universities an official manual on how to encourage students to join the newly created unmanned systems forces. Universities are required to report on their “work” to the ministry of defence’s main personnel directorate. Each faculty of the plekhanov russian university of economics is required to send two students to the front every month – group leaders are forced to recruit them. In parallel, a similar practice has been implemented in universities throughout russia. Students with academic debts are deliberately selected as the first group for recruiting – they are offered an alternative to expulsion. They are given three days to make a decision.

Advertisements for contracts have been posted in at least 16 st. petersburg’s universities: SPbSU, GUAP, polytechnical university, LETI, RANHiGS, GASU, the makarov naval academy, the stieglitz academy of arts, voenmech, and others – all publications appeared within one week. Among the moscow institutions – the moscow institute of physics and technology, the bauman state technical university of moscow, and the higher school of economics. The standard “offer” is money and a “special fixed-term contract” for one year, with academic leave for the duration of service. SPbSU additionally offers 50,000 rubles from the university itself. At the bonch-bruevich SPbSTU, they recruit even women, promising places in graduate school without exams after their return. At “korabelka” (“shipbuilder”) – (maritime technical university), recruiters from the selection point took students out of class and brought them one by one to the office for a “talk”.

The promised “right to resign after a year” turned out to be a fiction. The higher school of economics, which assured students of a one-year contract, actually made them sign ordinary indefinite military contracts that cannot be terminated. Besides, the standard contract of the ministry of defense does not contain any restrictions on the type of troops – the command has the right to assign a “UAV operator” to any unit, including assault ones.

When pressure does not work, the administration resorts to open humiliation. At the lunin college of transport technologies in novosibirsk, director maria kirsanova called an “educational meeting” after students refused en masse to sign contracts. She called the students cowards because they “came to study in order to dodge the army”. This episode is symptomatic: the system expected obedience, but instead received mass resistance – and responded with pressure and humiliation.

Universities in russia are often the only chance for young people to change their lives. Now this chance is being openly manipulated: sign the contract or lose your place. A system that cannot offer a normal future frightens people with expulsion and shames them for their fear of death.