Short answers, pulled from the story.
Saint Petersburg State University traces its founding to the 24th of January 1724, when Peter the Great issued a decree establishing the institution alongside the Academic Gymnasium and the Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences. The university as it operates today was reorganized from the Main Pedagogical Institute on the 8th of February 1819 by Alexander I.
The acceptance rate at Saint Petersburg State University is approximately 4 percent for both domestic and international applicants. In the 2023 admissions campaign, more than 106,000 domestic students applied for bachelor's and specialist programs, with 4,617 accepted. Over 21,000 international students applied for state-funded scholarships, with 1,000 accepted.
Saint Petersburg State University educated Russian presidents Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev, both of whom studied law there. The university also counted Vladimir Lenin among its alumni, along with the first presidents of Lithuania, Armenia, Poland, and Moldova, and Pyotr Stolypin, the third prime minister of the Russian Empire.
Notable scientists affiliated with the university include chemist Dmitri Mendeleev, mathematician Pafnuty Chebyshev, physicist Heinrich Lenz, chemist Aleksandr Butlerov, embryologist Alexander Kovalevsky, physiologist Ivan Sechenov, and pedologist Vasily Dokuchaev. On the 24th of March 1896, Alexander Popov publicly demonstrated transmission of radio waves for the first time in history on the university campus.
During the Soviet period, the university was known as Leningrad State University. In 1948 it was renamed after Communist official Andrei Zhdanov, giving it the full title Leningrad State University, named after A. A. Zhdanov and decorated with the Order of Lenin and the Order of the Red Banner of Labour. The Zhdanov name was removed in 1989 and the Leningrad designation was officially replaced with Saint Petersburg in 1992.
Saint Petersburg State University has two main campuses. The historic campus on Vasilievsky Island includes the Twelve Collegia main building, which houses the Library, the Faculty of Biology, and the Institute of Earth Sciences. A second suburban campus in Peterhof, formerly Petrodvorets, was planned in 1966 and completed by the 1990s; it houses the mathematics, chemistry, and physics faculties.