International Association of Ukrainian Studies seeks reform in Ukraine's higher education system (07/10/05)

International Association of Ukrainian Studies seeks reform in Ukraine's higher education system

by Zenon Zawada
Kyiv Press Bureau

DONETSK - A call for sweeping reform in Ukrainian higher education marked the sixth congress of the International Association of Ukrainian Studies (IAUS) in Donetsk.

Dr. Mark von Hagen, director of Columbia University's Ukrainian Studies program in New York, stirred the typically placid congress in his opening remarks on June 29 by stating the nation's educational and cultural governing bodies need an Orange Revolution of their own.

"Despite years of post-independence reform programs and proposals, the organizations that are most critical to IAUS have failed to construct a meaningful agenda for Ukrainian nation-building and the development of civic consciousness through the support of basic scholarship and culture," Dr. von Hagen said in his speech addressed to more than 600 scholars gathered at Donetsk National University during the last week of June.

Such organizations, which Dr. von Hagen identified as impediments to IAUS's progress, are the National Academy of Sciences, the National Association of Ukrainianists, the Ministry of Education and Science, the Ministry of Culture and the deputy minister for humanitarian affairs.

Dr. von Hagen's speech not only called into question the health and relevancy of IAUS, but also exposed a rift that exists in the Ukrainian academic community between the conservative National Academy of Sciences stalwarts on one side and reform-minded scholars on the other, namely Westerners and younger Ukrainians.

He thanked the Ministry of Education for providing the necessary funding for the congress, but then criticized its recent attempt to recentralize control of Ukraine's higher education system, thereby "rolling back important gains in university autonomy and academic freedom won since the end of Communist rule."

Dr. von Hagen told The Weekly that the Yushchenko government this year "significantly" cut financing for the sixth congress to $97,000, revealing that former president Leonid Kuchma's government was more committed to financing the IAUS.

The organization was so strapped for cash this year that Donetsk National University Rector Volodymyr Shevchenko had to borrow $100,000 to cover remaining expenses, Dr. von Hagen reported.

"If Ukrainian studies is supposed to be something they care about, they could've helped," Dr. von Hagen told The Weekly, referring to the Ukrainian government.

As a result of the restricted funding, Dr. von Hagen said in his speech, holding the IAUS congress every three years is likely beyond the Ukrainian government's financial ability and willingness.

He suggested hosting the congress every four or five years instead, and moving it to a foreign country, such as Poland "whose national association has been the most active."

Another crisis facing IAUS is its rapid growth that the congress budget cannot accommodate, Dr. von Hagen said. Organizers received 1,300 applicants for a congress that typically accommodated between 600 and 700 participants, he said.

As a result, hundreds of scholars were not included in the program, particularly those belonging to the heavily represented Kyiv contingent. Dr. von Hagen also singled out Deputy Minister for Humanitarian Affairs Mykola Tomenko and Culture Minister Oksana Bilozir for allowing Kyiv's Monastery of the Caves (Pecherska Lavra) to deteriorate, the archival system to collapse and the nation's film industry to decline.

Additionally, the Ukrainian language is weak and unstable in contemporary conditions, said Dr. von Hagen, who delivered his speech in Ukrainian, which he began studying only three years ago when elected IAUS president. He built his Ukrainian skills on his fluent Russian.

Mr. Tomenko delivered a speech at the conference's opening session, but left just before Dr. von Hagen spoke. He told Radio Svoboda afterwards that Dr. von Hagen does not have an adequate view of Ukrainian culture and even criticized IAUS.

"These books of between 300 and 500 volumes, which are published with budgetary funding, don't develop the Ukrainian language or culture," Mr. Tomenko said, referring to the academic journal published following each IAUS conference.

Hanna Skrypnyk, the IAUS vice-president for this year's conference and president of Ukraine's National Association of Ukrainianists, said there is no conflict within the IAUS.

In his criticism of the National Academy of Sciences, Dr. von Hagen said it is overly concentrated in Kyiv; dominated by the natural and applied sciences, while ignoring social sciences; and unable to integrate its research activities with its educational missions.

Reforming the National Academy of Sciences has been under discussion for a long time, Ms. Skrypnyk noted.

She said she was concerned that shifting IAUS conferences abroad would limit the number of Ukrainian scholars able to attend. Keeping the congress in Ukraine also enables Western scholars to re-immerse themselves in Ukrainian life and culture, Ms. Skrypnyk added.

While Ukrainians in the academic establishment weren't entirely receptive to Dr. von Hagen's criticisms, some academics from the West welcomed his frankness.

"It's a bureaucratized, centralized, paternalistic academic culture in Ukraine," said Olga Andriewsky, a professor of history at Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario. "Everything is about pecking orders. That's why his call for democratization is important."

An area that most scholars cited as in dire need of reform is Ukrainian academia's refusal to acknowledge degrees obtained abroad, or to allow students who achieve foreign degrees to matriculate back into the Ukrainian system.

Scholars from 17 nations attended the four-day IAUS conference and took part in about 125 overlapping sessions and roundtables.

These leading Ukrainian studies academics compared their research and discussed the intricacies of Ukrainian history, linguistics, culture and ethnography, among other numerous subjects.

Receiving special recognition at the conference was Donetsk native and former Soviet political prisoner Ivan Dzyuba, who was awarded an honorary doctorate by Donetsk National University, and Bohdan Osadczuk, a prolific journalist and professor at the Ukrainian Free University in Germany.

At the final session of the congress on July 2, Dr. von Hagen announced that astronomer Dr. Yaroslav Yatskiv of Ukraine was elected as his successor to the IAUS presidency.

IAUS national association representatives also selected Dr. Giovanna Brogi Bercoff, a professor of Slavistics at the University of Milan in Italy, as the new IAUS vice-president.

Current plans are for the IAUS to hold its next congress in Symferopol, Crimea. Bringing the conference to Crimea will raise Ukrainian consciousness there, Ms. Skrypnyk said.

Among the most visible and tangible reforms to emerge from the congress is that IAUS will consider hosting a smaller conference in Italy in the next year or two with the purpose of fostering Ukrainian studies outside of Ukraine and providing a more intense, academic atmosphere.

| Home Page |