Last month, Florida State University's Ukraine Task Force (UTF) welcomed the president of one of the oldest and most respected universities in Ukraine to discuss areas of collaboration and sign a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the two institutions.
Serhiy Kvit, president of the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy (NaUKMA), was on FSU's Tallahassee campus Nov. 16-22 to deliver several lectures and meet with administrators to discuss possible areas of cooperation. Kvit also met with Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs James Clark to sign an MOU between FSU and NaUKMA to expand global connections and outreach.
"It's a really important part of Florida State University's efforts to reach out to the world and be part of our global community in the education sector," said Steve McDowell, FSU's assistant provost for International Initiatives and interim dean of The Graduate School. "Florida State University is investing, and has invested for a long time, in being a global university."
Established in 1991 but with roots to 1615, NaUKMA is one of the few universities in Ukraine that offers bilingual instruction in English and Ukrainian and internationally recognized diplomas. Through collaboration with FSU, the two universities are merging global goals and furthering these international endeavors.
Housed in FSU's Learning Systems Institute (LSI), the UTF was established in 2022 as part of the university's broader internationalization strategy and aims to forge partnerships between FSU and Ukrainian scholars and educate the FSU community about Ukraine.
"We have contacts on the personal level with researchers and managers," Kvit said. "We have some common ideas. We have collaboration and mutual understanding between our university people in different fields of knowledge. So, the relationship is growing from the bottom to the top."
Kvit has served as president of KNU since 2022, a role he previously held from 2007 to 2014. He was appointed Minister of Education and Science in 2014 and retained that position until 2016. Under his leadership, Ukraine passed the 2014 Law on Education, legislation that helped align the country with Western standards and began a period of significant education reform that continues until this day. He is also a two-time Fulbright alumnus (Ohio University in 2006-2007 and Stanford University in 2018-2019).
"I had the opportunity to participate in different meetings and discussions," Kvit said. "I believe that we will develop our collaboration in the future in different fields of knowledge. I believe we can develop it in the natural sciences and in communication. It looks very promising."
While he was on-campus, Kvit delivered the presentation "Establishment/Reformation of Higher Education in Independent Ukraine: Challenges and Objectives" at the Anne Spencer Daves College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences. An international expert on educational issues, Kvit discussed the process of education reform that Ukraine has been undergoing the past 11 years, its relationship to the 2014 Revolution of Dignity and its importance for Ukraine's future development.
Kvit also delivered the lecture "Narratives at War: Ukraine's Media, Russian Propaganda, and Political Culture" as part of the College of Social Sciences and Public Policy's Anderson-Ashby Lectureship on Public Policy Journalism and the Center for Global Engagement's Engage Your World Speaker Series.
While on campus, Kvit toured the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, the largest and highest-powered magnet lab in the world, and met with researchers at the facility.
"We agreed with some researchers on how we can collaborate with my small university, which has the faculty of natural sciences," Kvit said.
He also met with law scholars at FSU's Center for the Advancement of Human Rights, which has the mandate of facilitating the development of human rights-related courses throughout the university, establishing human rights field placements for FSU students, and supporting non-governmental organizations throughout the world that engage in human rights work.
Kvit first visited FSU in 2018 through the Community College Administrator Program (CCAP). Sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, the CCAP is a program of study for administrators from post-secondary vocational and technical institutions in foreign countries to see how institutions meet the local workforce demand of their communities through innovative educational programs. It is administered by LSI at FSU in partnership with Santa Fe College in Gainesville, Florida.
The foundation laid in 2018 forged a connection that led to signing an MOU seven years later.
"I like your beautiful city and university," Kvit said. "I am here for the second time, and it is growing our mutual understanding of cooperation. I also think it is very important that your university community has created such a body as the Ukrainian Task Force. I am so grateful for that."
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