“... Encountering different histories, cultures, and ways of seeing the world ... can transform how students understand their subjects, their own histories, and their place in the world.”
—Professor Geneviève Zubrzycki
Imagine arriving in a land shaped by centuries of history and resilience, not as a tourist, but as someone finally living out a dream—meeting with European diplomats, excavating ancient ruins, walking the same stone-paved streets as your ancestors, or working in a local museum. For a growing number of University of Michigan students, that dream has become reality, thanks to the vision of two sisters who recognize the power of lived experiences to alter life journeys.
Stephanie and Suzette “Sue” Augustyniak know this truth intimately. At a young age, both their parents, Stefan and Teresa, experienced the terrible reality of World War II in Europe—Stefan surviving a German prisoner-of-war camp, Teresa growing up amid fierce fighting near Bologna. Yet it was years later, in a night school classroom in Detroit, that their lives intersected. Two immigrants, each carrying not only the weight of history but also a love of learning and a hope for the future, found each other and charted a course for their new family, grounded in the possibility that education offered.
Between them, Stefan and Teresa’s daughters went on to earn five degrees from the University of Michigan. In 2025, Stephanie (A.B. 1987; M.P.P. ’89) and Sue (A.B. 1978; A.M. ’81; Ph.D. ’84) Augustyniak established two funds, the M. Teresa Poggi Italy and the Mediterranean Fund, and the Stefan Augustyniak Fellowship in Polish Studies. Their support has already exposed six U-M students to the rich histories and modern societies of Italy and Poland.
Now, Stephanie and Sue Augustyniak have invested an additional $3 million to ensure that their parents’ legacy reaches even more students and scholars. Their new gift will establish the Stefan Augustyniak Visiting Fellowship in the Copernicus Center for Polish Studies (CCPS) and the M. Teresa Poggi Visiting Fellowship in the Weiser Center for Europe and Eurasia (WCEE), inviting graduate students and faculty from Poland and Italy to conduct research and engage with students at U-M. These visiting fellowships will expand opportunities for discovery and connection to students, faculty, and communities on both sides of the Atlantic.
“Taken together, Stephanie and Sue Augustyniaks' endowments will offer U-M students and faculty even greater opportunities for study, scholarly exchange, and collaboration with Italy and Poland,” said Geneviève Zubrzycki, Weiser Center for Europe and Eurasia and the Copernicus Center for Polish Studies director and the Weiser Family Professor of European and Eurasian Studies. “International education is about much more than studying another country from a distance. It means encountering different histories, cultures, and ways of seeing the world firsthand. These experiences can transform how students understand their subjects, their own histories, and their place in the world.”
Deepening Discovery in the Mediterranean
Stephanie and Sue's mother, Teresa Poggi, grew up in Gaggio Montano, near Bologna, Italy, a picturesque, ancient town that witnessed numerous battles and horrific atrocities during World War II. She left home at 16, after the war ended. The M. Teresa Poggi Italy and the Mediterranean Fund, established in 2025, honors her homeland by providing students with experiential learning opportunities related to Italy and the Mediterranean, as well as a lecture series on contemporary and historical issues in the region.
WCEE will host the inaugural Teresa Poggi Lecture on Italy and the Mediterranean World on Monday, November 2. The talk, “Signor Presidente:” Giorgia Meloni and the Italian Laboratory, will be delivered by Rachel Donadio, a Paris-based writer, contributor to The Atlantic, and a former Rome bureau chief and European culture correspondent for The New York Times. “We wanted the inaugural lecture to reflect the fund’s commitment to understanding Italy not only through its history and culture, but also through its contemporary political and social transformations,” said Zubrzycki. “Rachel Donadio brings a rare combination of deep knowledge of Italy, journalistic insight, and the ability to situate Italian developments in a broader European context.”
Importantly, the Poggi Fund also supports immersive summer research projects or internships for undergraduate and graduate students in Italy. One of three students who received support in summer 2025 is Lorraine Abagatnan, a Ph.D. candidate in the Interdisciplinary Program in Ancient Mediterranean Art and Archaeology (IPAMAA). Abagatnan is investigating Late Roman domestic spaces for her project, “Developing Digital Archaeology Skills and Research on Villas from Later Roman Sicily (284–641 CE).”
Receiving support from the Poggi Fund to travel to Italy was transformational for Abagatnan. Though Sicily is the geographical focus of her research, Abagatnan had not yet had the opportunity to visit the area to collect firsthand data. “My methodology relies heavily on visual analysis and the way our bodies move through space,” she said. “I needed to see and experience the ancient houses there myself.”
The Poggi Fund made it possible for Abagatnan to visit critical archaeological collections in Sicily—including pottery, grave inscriptions, and other artifacts—as well as Late Roman homesites. A highlight of the experience was two weeks of fieldwork at her dissertation's central site, the Villa del Casale in Piazza Armerina, part of an international project led by the University of Bologna, which offered invaluable opportunities to engage with leading scholars and receive expert feedback.
Beyond the immediate research objectives, the Poggi Fund’s support opened doors for Abagatnan to a broader exploration of Sicily’s rich cultural history. Being financially able to explore the island independently by car “proved to be a vital part of my brainstorming process,” she said. “My experience is now helping me to consider the way that people throughout time traveled around such a geographically diverse island, which will likely serve as a chapter topic in my dissertation.” For Abagatnan, 34 days of study in Italy proved to be more than a research trip—it was a period of genuine growth.
Exploring Diplomacy in Poland
In addition to supporting master’s and Ph.D. students pursuing research projects or internships in Poland, the Stefan Augustyniak Fellowship in Polish Studies also provides an opportunity for undergraduate students to pursue summer internships in Poland. It is named for Stephanie and Sue’s father, Stefan Augustyniak, who grew up in Poznań, Poland, and, at age 16, joined the Polish Underground in Warsaw during World War II. He was liberated from a German prisoner-of-war camp at the end of the war and earned an undergraduate degree before leaving for America in 1949—carrying forward a belief that education was vital, even in difficult times.
One of the first undergraduate students supported by the Augustyniak Fellowship in Polish Studies was LSA sophomore Sienna Smith, who participated in a hands-on, six-week summer 2025 internship with the International Cooperation Department at Warsaw City Hall. An international studies major interested in a career in diplomacy, Smith translated official documents, attended conferences and meetings with representatives from cities across Europe, conducted research on international partnerships, and observed how local governments collaborate to solve shared challenges—the very kind of real-world experience that transforms ambition into action.
Among her most notable experiences was assisting at Mayor Rafał Trzaskowski's annual Diplomatic Corps Dinner. “I welcomed ambassadors from around the world,” said Smith. “I also had the privilege of meeting with Deputy Chief of Mission Stephanie Holmes at the U.S. Embassy in Warsaw, an experience that reinforced my goal of one day serving in the Foreign Service.”
But beyond professional milestones, living in Warsaw led to a deeper, more meaningful connection to her Polish heritage and gave her a chance to improve her Polish language skills. “Every day challenged me to step outside of my comfort zone,” Smith said. “And I returned home with a greater appreciation for both my heritage and the importance of cross-cultural understanding.” Smith’s summer in Poland offered a glimpse of what Stefan Augustyniak understood decades ago: that place and purpose, when combined, can profoundly shape who we become.
Powering Global Exchange
For Stephanie and Sue Augustyniak, sending students abroad was just the beginning. Their new gift enables CCPS and WCEE to host visiting scholars in Ann Arbor for an entire academic year. It is a vision built on reciprocity. Just as Michigan students have been changed by their time in Poland and Italy, visiting scholars will broaden their impact by bringing what they’ve learned from their time at U-M back to their own academic communities.
The Stefan Augustyniak Visiting Fellowship in CCPS will welcome Polish graduate students from Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań for one academic year, fostering deeper engagement with Polish history, culture, and scholarship while strengthening ties between the two esteemed institutions.
Likewise, the M. Teresa Poggi Visiting Fellowship in WCEE will bring graduate students from the University of Bologna—one of the world’s oldest and most distinguished universities—to Ann Arbor, offering unparalleled opportunities for collaboration in Italian studies and beyond.
“Visiting fellowships give University of Michigan students and faculty direct access to leading international scholars,” said Zubrzycki. “Bringing scholars from Poland and Italy to Michigan for a full semester or an entire academic year creates opportunities that short visits simply cannot. It allows time for sustained collaboration, deeper engagement with students, and the development of research partnerships that can endure long after the fellowship ends. These scholars will become part of our intellectual community, with benefits that extend well beyond their own research.”
Stephanie and Sue Augustyniak’s gifts reflect their family's conviction that the enduring belief in education—which helped sustain their parents from devastation to discovery, from hardship to hope—can continue to change lives.
“What makes Stephanie and Sue Augustyniak’s gifts especially meaningful,” Zubrzycki explained, “is that they support international learning in both directions. They enable our students to immerse themselves in the histories and societies of Poland and Italy, while bringing graduate students and leading scholars from those countries to Michigan. The result is a richer intellectual community and lasting connections across institutions and borders.” The Augustyniak’s generosity will shape not just the students and scholars who experience it directly, but everyone they touch, for generations to come.
Life-Changing Education in LSA
Life-changing education in the University of Michigan’s College of Literature, Science, and the Arts takes shape through global experiential opportunities where students can make new discoveries, participate in the real-world work that they are interested in, or immerse themselves in the communities, places, and histories they are studying.
Look to Michigan for the foundational knowledge and experience to ignite purposeful change.
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