I graduated from Kyiv's regular school No. 29, but a strong math class was created there through the efforts of a wonderful mathematician and teacher, Yevhen Galitsyn. That's why I became a programmer while still in school, practicing on the Mir-2 computer. In 1985, I graduated with honors from the Department of Applied Mathematics at KPI and stayed at the institute. I returned to my native department as a lecturer in 1997.

What subjects do you teach?

"Discrete Mathematics, Mathematical Logic and Algorithm Theory, Artificial Intelligence Methods, Data Mining.

Please tell us about your hobbies.

I love traveling, visiting new countries and cities. It allows me to learn a lot about distant lands that you can't read in any books or guidebooks.

We bring back bells as souvenirs from each trip. We have a fairly large collection at home - probably about 300. The collection includes many bells of interesting shapes, made of different materials-metal, ceramics, and such unusual materials for bells as vine and wood.

In the past years, I often went hiking. I love my native Crimea very much - there you can find "pictures" for every taste. Vacations in Crimea are never boring.

As for my "home" hobbies, I try to visit the theater more often (unfortunately, I often fail), and I prefer classical opera and ballet performances. I enjoy visiting various exhibitions.

Imagine that all books, music, and movies could disappear on Earth, but you could keep one copy each. What would you keep?

It's hard to imagine. Of course, I have a few movies that I enjoy watching several times, favorite authors... But I'm not so categorical as to choose one thing. We will create new works.

Has there been anything in your life that has changed it dramatically? If so, what was it?

Perhaps the birth of my son can be considered such an event. You get to a different level of responsibility, your life priorities change, and you suddenly begin to understand your parents.

What changed in your life after the collapse of the Soviet Union?

It's hard to say what has changed, because everything is in flux, and we can only speculate how life would have turned out in some other scenario.

Life used to be more predictable. Now, due to the greater number of opportunities, people have more choices, and therefore need to make decisions on their own. Unfortunately, not everyone is capable of doing so, and many people get lost and do not find themselves in this life.

The collapse of the Soviet Union has brought big (and not always good) changes to a previously calm and measured life. However, there are more opportunities, especially for strong, intelligent, feisty young men and women: studying abroad, interesting new specialties, participation in projects. But all of this is most likely not so much related to the collapse of the union, but simply due to the progress and development of society.

There are more opportunities, but not all young people can find a job that is akin to labor.

In general, no cataclysms should disturb your inner world (I would like to see that). As Chateaubriand said: "If I still believed in happiness, I would look for it in the monotony of life's habits."

Are you sorry to expel students?

Yes, I do. I believe that this is a strong blow to a person, even if he or she does not realize it yet.

How do you feel about the fact that some students re-enter the same department?

I think that people who re-enter the department from which they were expelled are making a mistake. You can't step into the same river twice. Either this is not their path, or they are too lazy or irresponsible to allow themselves to be expelled. She returns to a place where her reputation is ruined, where everything reminds her of her failures. I can't think of a student who has re-entered our program and started studying better than before.

You can often hear that previous years were better than the current ones. How do you feel about this opinion? Is it true that the quality of education in our country is deteriorating every year?

The level of what I understand by education used to be higher, of course. Although today's youth has some knowledge that was unknown to previous generations. The expansion of the information field and the accessibility of many things have changed the style of thinking. In my opinion, the ability to analyze, to make elementary judgments has disappeared; the general cultural level of young people has significantly decreased; there is no initiative thinking, no creativity, and schoolboyishness is evident in everything. Sometimes the ignorance of elementary things and the poverty of thought are striking.

Can you give us an example of such changes?

For example, in the past, in order to prepare for an exam, a student would borrow a book from the library and write out some necessary things. And in order not to rewrite the entire volume, the text had to be carefully read, understood, analyzed, highlighted, and summarized. Nowadays, you just type in the words in a search engine, and in a second you have a ready-made answer on the screen, it's available, but no one lets it go through, because it's always at hand.

"Live long enough to learn." What have you studied or learned recently?

In principle, people who know how to think are always in the process of learning or discovering something new. If you approach everything you do with interest, you have to update your notes and fill your classes with new forms and examples. I also always thoroughly prepare for my trips: I choose routes and study maps.

It is said that people with an active learning streak live longer and happier. I wish the same to all of you.