Sometimes we experience a trouble, but its consequences are much harder than it was expected. Or, on the contrary, we reach something, and it brings us more than we supposed it to be. It is like an iceberg: you see only a smaller part of it being far from it, but its real size can be realized only while colliding with it.

Icebergs are sometimes nice, though. Marina Rashchepkina, member of VladMUNRFE, faced her iceberg after getting a scholarship of Vladimir Potanin as a result of 2-day contest, including an intelligence test and a set of tasks aimed at showing of participants’ leadership skills, team work, public speaking etc. A won scholarship was not the end, as she was also granted an opportunity to take part in Potanin Summer School, June, 27 – July, 1, 2011, in the park-hotel “Olympian”, Moscow area.

There are Winter and Summer schools for Potanin scholars each half a year, and, if you become a scholar, there are two ways to become its participant. You can make a team of several scholars, write a project, and, if you are chosen, there is another opportunity to prove its excellence and win a grant for its implementation. Another way is only for sophomores, who should write an essay and, if chosen, work during the school either in the press-centre or in the event-group.

Marina became a member of the event-group and enjoyed her 5 bright, lively days there. She told that the spirit of victory, energy, stamina and desire to change the world were the basic features characterizing young people there and the whole school. The projects make the youth’s life, and many of them are implemented even if the project team doesn’t win a grant.

This contest can make one more opportunity for MUNRFE members, giving not even the money or the chance to make the project on the highest level, but one more spur to personal growth and one more confident step on the path of your life.