First success stories.

Members of the Young Scientists (YS) of the World Economic Forum have registered humanitarian aid requests under the EU Civil Protection Mechanism for immediate delivery to Ukraine, and followed these requests through the administrative apparatuses of their home countries. They have built trust between civil administrators in the Ukraine and at home by reaching out to Ukrainian Ambassadorial services for verification of contacts, requests and logistics offers.

Yehveniia Polishchuk engaged host institutions (among them the King’s Russia Institute) and funding bodies to launch an interdisciplinary research project related to the consequences of the war in Ukraine that integrates “Western” and Ukrainian scholars. The unwavering hope is that this crisis will be a chance for a wider integration of Ukrainian academia and academics into “Western” structures of education, knowledge exchange, and funding.

Individual actions at YS home institutions led to efforts to archive academic and cultural data endangered by physical and digital attacks. Similar efforts aim to preserve physical objects that require special facilities, such as sensitive biological and chemical samples, or historical documents, specimens, and artifacts. As Ukraine’s museums, memorials, and other heritage sites are threatened and destroyed, rescue operations are working to safeguard irreplaceable history and culture. Because of the ongoing pandemic, the wide-spread availability of digital lecture courses and the move to hybrid and online teaching at universities world-wide will enable continuous education and qualification of Ukrainian students, and – most importantly – it will embed them in networks and meaningful structures in times of the ongoing crisis. Critically, universities world-wide have provided placements in research groups, Visa fee waivers, and academic lodging for Ukrainian colleagues who were forced to flee their country.