The paper analyzes the contribution of the Institute of Archaeology and Art Studies of the Russian Association of Scientific Research Institutes of Social Sciences (RANION) to the personal development of many archaeologists - representatives of the Moscow archaeological school. V.A. Gorodtsov was at the origins of the systematic training of archaeologists at the 1st faculty of MSU and RANION in the 1920s – early 1930s. The majority of Moscow archaeologists who graduated from the Department of Social Sciences of MSU and the postgraduate training program of the Institute of Archaeology and Art Studies of RANION were direct students of V.A. Gorodtsov and attended his lectures, seminars and expeditions. Vasily Alekseevich strove to prepare “serious archaeologists” providing them with theoretical and methodological knowledge, and the skills of laboratory and field work. His students conducted independent archaeological studies and excavations starting from the second year of the graduate program. Moscow archaeological school (S.V. Kiselev, A.V. Artsikhovsky, A.Ya. Bryusov, D.A. Krainov, M.E. Foss, P.A. Dmitriev, A.P. Smirnov, L.A. Evtyukhova, V.P. Levasheva, O.A. Krivtsova-Grakova, B.A. Rybakov, E.I. Krupnov, and others) established on the basis of V.A. Gorodtsov’s pedagogical school in the 1920s.