SRF (and associates) in the news
February 2012: 5% of all visitors to Walter Scott’s home Abbotsford are Russians – Scotsman interview with SRF chair Jenny Carr and Vice-President Dairmid Gunn on why the Russians read Scott while many of his compatriots no longer do. You can read the article here.16 February 2012: The Russian Embassy presented our chair, Jenny Carr, an award (Почётный знак Россотрудничества) for the SRF’s contribution to "friendship and cooperation". The presentation took place on Monday 16 January when John Swinney and other representatives of the Scottish Government met representatives of Russian companies at the Embassy and briefed them on the investment climate in Scotland. Phioto L-R: Russian Fisheries Minister Andrey Krayniy, Scottish Finance Minister John Swinney, SDI Moscow manager Yuri Andreev, the Russian Ambassador Alexander Yakovenko and Jenny Carr. See http://rusemb.org.uk/activity/42
September 2011: Publicity for our "Poyekhali" exhibition about Gagarin includes an STV news interview (6pm News on 16 Sept, starts at 13.40mins) and web article, a preview in the Herald's Saturday Arts magazine on 17 Sept (page 2), a Scotsman article and top billing on the Yuri Gagarin50 website yurigagarin50.org. Guests at the opening incl. (L-R) Ralph Gibson of Novosti and the Consuls General of Ukraine, Russia and Japan - see Universal News picture - as well as Germany (not in the photograph).
10 September 2011: The ITI (Inst of Translators and Interpreters) held a workshop at the Scotland-Russia Institute - see picture
June 2011: Cosmonaut Anatoly Artsebarsky toured Scotland with us 12-17 June, visiting schools in Orkney, Edinburgh and Glasgow as well as the Scottish Space School at Strathclyde University, the Glasgow Science Centre and the stone in the Skara Brae timeline commemorating Gagarin's flight in 1961. Press coverage included an STV News item and a Radio Orkney interview as well as George Watsons College website. The visit was sponsored by Rossotrudnichestvo and a report is on their site too - http://rs.gov.ru/node/26376. The Scottish Space School public lecture can be viewed in full here. Item in Strathclyde University's "Engineering Insight" journal, page 3.
February 2011: Dr Sarah Smyth, head of Russian at Trinity College Dublin and a good friend of the SRF, was awarded the prestigious Pushkin Medal by President Medvedev for her outstanding service to the promotion of Russian language and culture.
20 January 2011: Niamh Gorry, a graduate of Glasgow Uni and now an SRF-recruited English language assistant at the Donskoy Technical University in Rostov, featured in a recent online article on the university website www.donstu.ru/ajax/relay/news/709/
14-20 January 2011: Русская Мысль (scanned text), no. 1 (4824), page 6. Illustrated article by Varvara Bashkirova on the Scientists Round Table held at the SRI in December. Photo supplied to RM by Ilia Kuznetsov.
October 2010 onwards New Voice of Russia books programme on English-language books from and about Russia is presented by SRF associate Ian Mitchell.
22 September 2010: NTV. Russian TV programme about the discovery of Walter Scott manuscripts by an SRF member includes footage of her two young sons reading the Russian translation of an unpublished poem and discussing it in fluent Russian, which they have been learning out of school for about 3 years. See also Friends of Loch Lomond website.
5 September 2010: Scotsman. Report on the SRF campaign to keep school exams in Russian. See also Keep School Exams.
July 2010:Русский Язык за Рубежом. SRF supporter and veteran of the convoys, Jock Dempster, unexpectedly turned up on the back cover of the latest issue of this journal.
16 June 2010: Scotsman. 4 star review of our exhibition - Craig Brandist's "St. Petersburg: Reflections of a Floating Life". The Scotsman called Craig Brandist "an adept and imaginative photographer".
30 April 2010: Inverness Courier. Urals-Scottish Society meets the Highland-Russia Connection in Inverness
March 2010: Kachkanar newspaper . SRF member Doris McCann is teaching in the Urals.
20 February 2010: Scotsman. More on why more Russian should be taught.
10 February 2010: Scotsman. Long article on Russian language teaching and SRF; also includes interviews with Russian teacher at Fortrose and with Russian Edinburgh School.
5 February 2010: Scotsman. News of the SRF's plans to use their grant from Russkiy Mir to encourage Russian teaching in Scottish schools.
19 January 2010: BBC Radio Scotland. SRF members took part in the Massed Borders Choir rehearsal in Kelso on 16 January for a performance of Prokofiev's Alexander Nevsky and Borodin's Polovtsian Dances in Russian (the concert will take place on 5 June).