The Ukraine Rebuilding Initiative (URI) began as a UF student organization in August 2023 with a mission to help rebuild and heal the city of Nizhyn, Ukraine. With projects across a range of academic areas - from engineering to business to agriculture and more - the organization has attracted students of all majors who want to contribute their expertise to this humanitarian cause, some of whom also have personal ties to Ukraine and Russia. This semester, URI has launched a new virtual exchange (VE) initiative as one of its projects, with the goal of supporting dialogue between UF and Nizhyn Gogol State University students and providing a space for them to share about their respective cultures.
The VE project is being organized and facilitated by graduating seniors Mikhail Mikhaylov and Grace Wright, who also lead URI. To prepare UF students to participate in this exchange, Grace and Mikhail organized workshops in collaboration with UF’s English Language Institute (ELI) and the Counseling and Wellness Center (CWC). These sessions equipped UF participants with the skills to navigate sensitive and emotional topics, ensuring that discussions are mutually enriching and respectful. They then paired up participants from both sides of the project, who have committed to meeting for at least one hour each week during the second half of this semester. UF participants will report back on how their meetings are going through a Canvas shell, and both the student facilitators and the CWC are making themselves available to answer questions and provide support when needed.
With strong support from URI’s faculty advisors, Dr. Pasha Antonenko from the College of Education, Dr. Ingrid Kleespies from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, and Dr. Olesya Savchenco from the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, the students plan to continue to develop the VE and URI’s other initiatives in the semesters to come, using the knowledge and experience they have gained thus far.