30 years ago, on August 24, 1991, Ukraine gained Independence. At that time, our University showed high civic activity, which continues till today.
The university has always been at the forefront of the national democratic process and has never stood aside historically important events. Polytechnicians of different generations fought for the sovereignty of the state and the right to be called Ukrainians. Each of them contributed to the Independence of Ukraine with his work and decisive actions.
Today we will make a brief excursion into the most important events from that time to this day and which have significantly affected the development of the University and its place on the world stage.
December 14, 1988. The Ukrainian Language Society (later the Taras Shevchenko Prosvita Society) began to operate at Lviv Polytechnic. The first and most important task set by the Society was to introduce the Ukrainian language into the educational and scientific process, as well as to translate into Ukrainian russified documentation of the Institute during the Soviet time.
1989. Activists of the Ukrainian Language Society together with representatives of the administration and the academic community of the Institute concluded «A Program of organizational and methodological measures of LPI for the implementation of the Law of the USSR «On Languages in the USSR», which was successfully implemented till 1992.
1990. The Revolution on Granite lasted in Kyiv from October 2 to 17. Most of the participating students were from Lviv Polytechnic. At the initiative of the Ukrainian Student Union and the Lviv Student Brotherhood, a number of actions of civil disobedience took place. The students went on a political hunger strike, establishing a tent camp in the center of the capital, on the October Revolution Square (now Independence Square).
«The idea to start a student hunger strike was born in Lviv to the leader of the Student Brotherhood Markiian Ivashchyshyn, a representative of the Lviv Polytechnic Institute», told the participants of the action to Radio Svoboda.
On October 17, at the suggestion of the patriotic community and, first of all, the Ukrainian Language Society, at the conference of the Polytechnic staff it was decided to raise the Ukrainian national flag above the main building of the Institute. On the same day, the flag was consecrated in the St. George’s Cathedral. On October 18, the Ukrainian sacred flag was waving majestically over the Polytechnic, the national anthem was playing.
1991. Professor Yurii Rudavskyi became the first democratically elected rector of Lviv Polytechnic in independent Ukraine (based on the Statute of February 27, 1991).
1992. The Prosvita People’s House was established on the basis of the student club. Now there are 12 amateur art groups.
1993, June. The Institute received the fourth (highest) level of accreditation and the status of a university. At the same time, a new name was approved – Lviv Polytechnic State University.
In the same year, on the initiative of Rector Rudavskyi, who believed «… the language will live fully if the main disciplines are provided with textbooks and manuals», a publishing house was established at the University.