Today's students have to make every effort to gain quality knowledge. In recent years, they have been socially isolated due to quarantine, suffered psycho-emotional suffering, and faced the horrors of war. Their education was interrupted and changed format - from full-time to distance/mixed and back to full-time. It is all the more pleasant to talk about our students who, despite all the obstacles, not only acquire professional knowledge but also successfully find applications for it.
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“To learn means to grow. With every new knowledge you build your tomorrow,” is the life credo of Svitlana Muzyka, a second-year master's student of the Department of Machines and Apparatus of Chemical and Oil Refining Production of the IHF, who received a scholarship from the President of Ukraine this semester.
School. Svitlana was a bright and diligent student. Her favorites were math and chemistry. Mathematics was understandable: the clarity of formulas and transformations was fascinating. And chemistry? It turns out that already in her school years, the girl sought to understand the processes taking place around her: how substances work, what interactions occur between them, and what results from such reactions. She wanted to see the structure and logic of phenomena - “what comes after what, and why it happens this way.” Her childlike curiosity motivated her to enter the Faculty of Engineering and Chemistry. She chose Kyiv Polytechnic, known as a university that provides high-quality technical education, “to get knowledge at a high level.”
Bachelor's degree. While studying for her bachelor's degree, the student became interested in research and joined experimental studies. Unfortunately, the full-scale invasion made it impossible for her to work in the laboratory for some time, but it did not deter her interest in studying and research. At the suggestion of her future supervisor, Serhii Gulienko, Svitlana joined the theoretical research on membrane processes that could be conducted remotely. The developments were reflected in her bachelor's project, which was devoted to the modernization of a seawater desalination plant with the development of a reverse osmosis apparatus. At the time of receiving her bachelor's degree, by the way, with honors, the student had already co-authored five scientific papers, including an article in a journal included in the Web of Science scientometric database.
Experience. Later, the young researcher continued her master's degree, successfully combining the educational process with work at the patent office. As the student herself says, “although the field of intellectual property belongs to the legal specialties, it is extremely difficult to work with inventions and utility models without technical education.” She explains: “Most people, unfortunately, do not understand the field of intellectual property and do not know what it is. I work as an assistant patent attorney, namely a patent engineer. My job is to identify the object of invention, create, prepare and file patent applications for various technical solutions. To do so, I need to understand the essence of the technical idea, conduct a patent search, analyze existing solutions, and prepare an application consisting of claims, description, drawings, and abstract. Without specialized knowledge, it is difficult to accurately describe an invention and understand how it works, so my technical education is an important factor in the work of a patent engineer. Of course, it is difficult to combine work and study, but I am very grateful to my director, Petro Borovyk, also a KPI graduate, who understands the complexity of studying and always supports and helps.”
Master's program. Currently, the student is working on her master's thesis on the modernization of a potash fertilizer production plant. In her work, she proposes to add a membrane apparatus to the system for separating the product from the solution. This will significantly reduce energy consumption for evaporation and increase the energy efficiency of the plant as a whole. As of today, her creative work includes 10 scientific papers, including two articles indexed by Scopus and Web of Science.
In general, the master's student has ambitious plans, although it is difficult to predict anything now. First, she wants to get another, or maybe more, higher education, “to dive deeper into the field of intellectual property.” Moreover, she wants to develop as a professional, “because the constant acquisition of knowledge and skills is the key to success in any field.” It is also important for her to “keep abreast of the latest technologies and changes in order to remain competitive and effective in her work.”
About Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute. It is quite obvious that Svitlana speaks gratefully of her mentors: “Thank you very much to all the teachers of the MAHNV department for their knowledge, advice and help.” But special words of gratitude go to her supervisor, Serhii Hulienko: “Serhii Valeriiovych is a teacher with a capital T. I remember it as if it were today: in my first year of bachelor's degree, he explained descriptive geometry to me, because I didn't have a drawing at school, and it was difficult for me. I didn't understand what projections were, where to put which points, and Serhii Valeriiovych used a piece of paper, various improvised objects, and a flashlight on his phone to show me how an object would look from the front, top, left, and right, using the shadow reflected on the paper. Throughout my years of study, he was a person who was always ready to support, explain, and help. Even when I gave an interview for KPI Media about entering the IHF in 2024, he and Olena Husarova came to support me. Honestly, it touched me, I was very nervous then, because I had no experience of talking on camera.”
At the end of the conversation, the student unexpectedly confessed: “Yes, studying was sometimes very difficult, and at times I regretted this choice, but my colleagues and teachers did not let me give up. In such a difficult and unstable time, when it is difficult to predict what will happen tomorrow, it is very important to maintain love, respect, and compassion for those around you - in short, to remain human.”