The Scholars at Risk Fellowship was created in spring 2022 in response to the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in support of Ukrainian scholars who could not safely conduct their research in Ukraine because of the ongoing war. WCEE Scholars at Risk Fellows were matched with U-M faculty partners in fields similar to their own for research visits from September 2022 through August 2023. Awards were offered to the scholars below, who have returned to Ukraine to pursue their research.
Daryna Dvornichenko was selected as a WCEE Scholars at Risk Fellow and untimately declined the award. She is associate professor of law at National University, Odesa Maritime Academy. She received her Ph.D. in political science from Odesa I. Mechnikov National University, where she also earned an M.A. and B.A. in international relations. Professor Dvornichenko additionally earned certificates at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, European Academy of Diplomacy (Warsaw), and British Law Centre. Since 2019, she has been an adviser to the head of Research Institute of Informatics and Law of the National Academy of Legal Sciences of Ukraine. She has been a guest lecturer at the University for Foreigners in Perugia, University of Zagreb, and Ukrainian Catholic University, and is the author of over 40 publications on issues of European integration and gender. In 2021, Dvornichenko was affiliated with the University of Wroclaw as a Kirkland Research Fellow, and in 2022 she completed a year as a Fellow at the German Marshall Fund for the USA doing research on the role of women in politics in Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova. She is also a founder of “Agents of Change!”—a nongovernmental organization that promotes women’s participation in decision-making and non-formal education in Ukraine. Her U-M faculty mentor is Geneviève Zubrzycki, professor of sociology.
Iryna Sikorska was a WCEE Scholars at Risk Fellow from April to July, 2022. She is associate professor of the Department of Sociology at Donetsk State University of Management in Mariupol (displaced to Mariupol in 2014 due to Russian aggression and military conflict in Eastern Ukraine). She holds a Ph.D. in public administration from Donetsk State University of Management, with the dissertation, “The Mechanisms of Enhancement of State Governance of Higher Education in Ukraine in the context of European Integration.” In 2015, she founded the Ukrainian Association of Professors and Researchers of European Integration (APREI), which is a platform for cooperation among academia and civil society to promote European integration processes in Ukraine. Her research interests include European intercultural education policies, intercultural dimensions of internationalization of higher education, and development of intercultural competences in higher education. Her U-M faculty mentor is Geneviève Zubrzycki, professor of sociology.
Anna Taranenko was a WCEE Scholars at Risk Fellow from August 2022 to August 2023. She is a senior lecturer in the Department of International Relations at the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy. She holds a Ph.D. in international relations from the Institute of World Economy and International Relations, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. Taranenko also holds an M.A. in Hispanic studies from the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) under the auspices of the Fulbright Graduate Student Program. Her professional experience encompasses work at the International Research and Exchanges Board (IREX), Constitutional Court of Ukraine, ADASTRA think tank, and internships at the Ukrainian Parliament and the Parliament of Canada. Her research interests include foreign policy analysis, conflict resolution, and international security–in particular, cybersecurity, fighting disinformation, and enhancing media literacy. Her U-M faculty mentor is Brian Weeks, associate professor of communication and media.
Kseniya Yurtayeva is an associate professor of the Department of Criminal Law and Criminology of Kharkiv National University of Internal Affairs. She holds a Ph.D. in criminal law, criminology, and criminal-executive law from the State Research Institute of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, and an LL.M. in international and comparative law from Chicago-Kent College of Law. The topic of her dissertation was “The Place of the Commission of Crimes of International Character.” She teaches courses in criminal law, criminology, and cybercrime prosecution. Professor Yurtayeva is also a certified trainer of the National School of Judges of Ukraine and a developer of the course in cybersecurity and human rights in cyberspace for judiciary candidates.
In the 2022-23 academic year as a WCEE Scholars at Risk Fellow, Professor Yurtayeva conducted research work on the topics “Cyberaggression as a Method Applied in Contemporary Warfare” and “Engaging Post-Truth in Shadowing Russian War Crimes.” She also participated in the Midwestern Symposium “Russia and the Future of European Security” (Ann Arbor, USA); and scientific conferences “Cybersecurity in Ukraine: Organizational and Legal Issues” (Odesa, Ukraine), “Russia’s War of Aggression against Ukraine. Challenges of Prosecuting and Documenting War Crimes” (Berlin, Germany), and “Criminality and Crime Counteraction in Conditions of War: Global, Regional and National Dimensions” (Vinnytsia, Ukraine). Yurtayeva coauthored the textbooks Criminal Law of Ukraine in questions and answers, Increasing Capacity of Law Enforcement Agencies in Overcoming Online Child Abuse, and Problem book in Criminal Law of Ukraine: General and Specific Parts; published the scientific articles “Criminal Liability for Cybercrimes Committed at Time of the Armed Conflict: International Tendencies and Ukrainian Realities” and “Autonomous and Automated Vehicles on the Roads of Ukraine: Prospects of Introducing and Issues of Legal Regulation” (the latter as co-author). During the 2023-24 academic year as a WCEE Scholars at Risk Fellow, Professor Yurtayeva will teach the course “Theory of Hybrid Conflicts in the Context of Russia-Ukraine War.”
Her U-M faculty mentor is Susan D. Page, professor of practice in international diplomacy at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy and professor from practice at the Law School.
