Stockman completed his secondary education at the Republican Specialized Physics and Mathematics Boarding School in Kyiv. Following his graduation, he enrolled to Kyiv State University to study physics; he subsequently transferred to Novosibirsk State University, where he obtained his Master of Science in 1970. He completed his PhD at Institute of Nuclear Physics in Novosibirsk in 1974 under the supervision of Spartak Belyaev and Vladimir Zelelevinsky. His doctoral research work concentrated on nuclear physics. During his PhD, he met and married Branislava Mezger and had a son, Dmitriy, in 1978.
