Autobiography

                                        by Andrei Petrovich Ershov

I was born in Moscow on April 19, 1931. At that time my father, Piotr Nikolaevich Ershov, was a
postgraduate student, and my mother, Tatiana Konstantinovna Malinina, worked as a teacher. In

1937 the family moved to Rubezhnoe in Donbass, the town to which father was assigned to a job at
a chemical industrial complex. We lived in Rubezhnoe until the April of 1943. During the period
since the August of 1942 to the February of 1943 Rubezhnoe was occupied by Germans. Since the
May of 1943 we lived in Kemerovo, where a part of Rubezhnoe Chemical industrial complex was
evacuated and later reorganized into Kemerovo aniline dye factory. Father worked at this factory

continuously until his retirement in 1980. My mother is a housewife. My younger brother Sergei
Petrovich works as a controlling and measuring apparatus adjuster.

After leaving school in 1949, I entered the Moscow State University. After graduation in 1954, I
was assigned for postgraduate study in computing mathematics.

Since 1953 I had a part-time job first at the Institute of Precise Mechanics and Computing
Techniques and later (since 1955) at the Computing Center of the USSR Academy of Sciences. On
completion of my postgraduate study in 1957 I worked at the Computing Center as the head of the
department of theoretical programming.

In the summer of 1957, in response to Academician S.L. Sobolev’s proposal, I decided to move to
the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences. In the end of 1957 I started working on
organization of the department of programming at the Institute of Mathematics of the USSR SBAS.
Since the April of 1959 I was a part-time head of this department, and since the May of 1960
moved to a full-time status. Since the beginning of 1964, when the Computing Center became a
separate institution, I work there as a department head.

Since 1955 I wrote more than 200 papers on various problems of theoretical and applied
programming and adjoining branches of science. In the  January of 1962 I proved my PhD thesis,
and in the May of 1967 – my Doctor’s degree thesis. In 1970 I was elected the Corresponding
Member of the USSR Academy of Sciences in mathematics.

Since 1956 I am engaged in teaching first at the Moscow University and since 1961 – in
Novosibirsk University first as assistant, then as assistant professor and since 1968 – as Professor.

Since the beginning of 1961 I concern myself with the issues of researching computers as means and
subject of school education – first in the course of extracurricular activities, then in skill training
lessons and elective courses. I organized a standing School for Young Programmers of Novosibirsk
Soviet District that had its first graduation; I managed work of six Summer Schools for Young
Programmers; I run the “Art of Programming” column in “Kvant” journal as a member of its
editorial board. In 1981 I was invited as a keynote speaker to the IFIP World Conference on
Computers in Education. I am in charge of the “Software Development for School Educational
Process” program carried out in accordance with the decision of the USSR State Committee on
Science and Technology.

Since 1958 I frequently visited foreign countries with the purpose of participating in conferences
and congresses, lecturing and working in the International Federation for Information Processing
institutions. I am a member of a number of international and foreign scientific organizations; in
particular, in 1976 I was awarded to the title of the British Computing Society Distinguished
Fellow.

In 1967 and 1976 I was awarded a “Working Red Banner” Order for participation in foundation and
development of the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences, in 1970 – an anniversary
medal “Centenary of V.I. Lenin”, in 1981 – a “Sign of Honor” Order for good results of the 10^th
five-year plan.

In 1952 I married Nina Mikhailovna Stepanova, who was then my fellow student. Having graduated
from the Moscow State University in 1955, my wife worked there as a programmer. Now she is a
senior laboratory assistant at the Institute of Mathematics of the USSR SBAS. I have two children -
a son, Vasily, born in 1953 and a daughter, Anna, born in 1959.