Southern Federal University

Southern Federal University is a modern research university with emphasis on innovations and entrepreneurship. In its academic activities it combines studies with fundamental and applied science, as well as cutting-edge technologies and innovative approaches.

Southern Federal University is the largest research and educational establishment of Rostov Oblast. The university began to operate in Rostov-on-Don in 1915 as an affiliate part of Imperial University of Warsaw whose Russian staff had been evacuated from Poland with the onset of World War I. Later, with the collapse of Russian Empire, the university was named Donskoy University after the region of Don by the decree of Russian Provisional Government on May 5, 1917.

When founded in 1915, Donskoy University was the first higher education institution in Rostov-on-Don and had four academic departments: history & philosophy, medicine, physics & mathematics, and law. In 1917-1920, during Russian Civil War, Rostov-on-Don was under the control of the anti-Soviet coalition forces of Russian White movement including Kaledin's Don Army. Many of the staff who found refuge at Donskoy University at that time had a strong anti-Soviet stance and students were being drafted to White Army.