There is a permanent Microsoft DreamSpark promotion where students can get free professional versions of Microsoft software listed at the following link: www.dreamspark.com For Russia, the list of proposed software is more modest: www.dreamspark.ru But the main drawback at the beginning was the need to confirm their student status with the help of the ISIC card data, which 99.9% of our students do not have. Now, finally, the problem has been solved, verification has been added with the help of an ordinary student card, which needs to be scanned or photographed and uploaded during registration of the program participant. Finally, Russian students had the opportunity to get expensive software for free and without difficulty. The same change affected the MS Office 2007 distribution program among students, faculty and university staff at a discount of 80%. Details here: www.microsoft.com/rus/studentoffice/buy.aspx I am very happy for my Russian colleagues in splitting granite of science, it is unlikely that the same opportunity will appear in Ukraine in the next two years, I personally will have time to finish the university :)