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Sunday, March 30, 2025
Get Engaged Alumni Workshop Series: Creating Inclusive Spaces for People with Disabilities
Online Event 10:00 am – 11:00 am EDT/GMT-4
This workshop will focus on creating inclusive spaces for people with disabilities, exploring barriers and how to overcome them. Participants will learn practical strategies to make environments more accessible, foster empathy, and promote inclusion in schools and communities. They will also gain tools to advocate for and implement inclusive practices within their own communities, leaving with actionable ideas to create a more inclusive world.
Workshop leader Vickania Turenne, from Haiti, is about to graduate in business administration from Quisqueya University and is a sign language interpreter. She is an alumna of the Haitian Education and Leadership Program scholarship and the Get Engaged Conference 2024. She is currently working on a project focused on UN Sustainable Development Goals 16 and 10 named Coaching for Social Inclusion, addressing violence and inequalities. Her project addresses people with disabilities and under-resourced children.
Register to join online
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Wednesday, March 26, 2025
Seminar: Are the Czech Parties Serious about Climate?
Online Event 12:30 pm – 2:00 pm EDT/GMT-4
12:30 PM New York l 5:30 PM Vienna
Open Society Hub for the Politics of the Anthropocene at CEU presents a seminar with Petra Vodová, Assistant Professor at the Department of Political Science, University of Hradec Králové, Czech Republic, on Czech political parties' reaction to climate change.
Despite the relative disappearance of the Green Party from the Czech parliamentary landscape, climate crisis and environmental issues retained salience for many young voters. An opportunity arose for a new party to attract younger, post-materialist, educated urban voters, who prioritize environmental protection and civic activism. The Czech Pirate Party seemed to seize the opportunity when it achieved significant success in 2017 and entered government in 2021. While both Czech Greens and Pirates highlight environmental issues as a priority, their approaches differ. The Green Party positions environmental concerns as central to its mission, focusing on comprehensive ecological policies, including renewable energy sources, biodiversity protection, and sustainable agriculture. The Pirates place less emphasis on these issues, prioritizing policies such as waste recycling, public transportation, and innovative technologies.
Petra Vodová will present her analysis of party manifestos, the Pirate digital forum and interviews with Pirates responsible for the creation of environment/climate change policy stances. The development of Pirate positions on environment/climate change issues will be explained, as will relations with the Czech Greens.
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Wednesday, March 26, 2025
IWT/CLASP Workshop on "Supporting Writing to Learn with Technology"
Online Event 9:00 am – 11:00 am EDT/GMT-4
9 AM New York l 2 PM Vienna
The Spring 2025 IWT/CLASP Workshop Series continues with "Supporting Writing to Learn with Technology"
How can we support a student-centered online classroom through integrating writing-to-learn practices? This workshop takes a hands-on, practical approach – allowing participants the opportunity to experiment with different digital technologies – Perusall, Discussion Boards, Padlet, Google Docs, Whiteboards, and Mentimeter. We will explore pairing each of these technologies with a specific writing-based practice – such as Process Writing, Dialectical Notebooks, or others. We will discuss the challenges of using digital tools for writing-based learning online, how to integrate these pairings into our own classrooms, and how specific tools can be used with different kinds of writing for different purposes.
Learn about the series and register here
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Wednesday, March 19, 2025
IWT/CLASP Workshop on "Debate in the Classroom"
Online Event 9:00 am – 11:00 am EDT/GMT-4
9 AM New York l 2 PM Vienna
The Spring 2025 IWT/CLASP Workshop Series continues with "Debate in the Classroom."
Join the directors of the Bard Debate Union for a session focused on incorporating debate in the classroom. This workshop will cover best practices for using debate in the classroom, including appropriate formatting, topic writing, logistics, and assessment. Anyone interested in adding debate to their classroom, fine-tuning an existing debate assignment, or deciding whether assigning a debate would work for their classroom is invited to join.
Learn about the series and register here
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Wednesday, March 19, 2025
Silenced, Erased, and Disconnected: The Fight for Palestinian Digital Rights
Online Event 10:10 AM New York | 3:10 PM Vienna
The OSUN Network Collaborative course on "Freedom of Expression" announces a series of online guest lectures that are available for the public to observe online.
The first lecture will be delivered on March 19 by Jalal Abukhater, a Palestinian rights advocate based in Jerusalem. Abukhater is the Advocacy Manager at 7amleh, the Arab Center for the Advancement of Social Media, a digital rights organization that fights for a free, fair, and safe digital space for all Palestinians.
The lecture will focus on the suppression of Palestinian voices online within contexts of targeting of journalists, access to information, issues of connectivity in Palestine, and current advocacy campaigns calling to restore and rebuild Gaza’s telecom sector. Abukhater would discuss how some tech company CEOs are aligning themselves with authoritarian political players, how they may be complicit in human rights violations and facilitating behaviors that fuel real-world harm—while failing to uphold legal obligations and other human rights frameworks. The lecture will be followed by a Q&A session.
Viewers can address questions to Abukhater in advance by sending an email to Kseniya Shtalenkova at [email protected]
Please indicate "Lecture with Jalal Abukhater" as the email subject.
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Thursday, March 13, 2025
Life in Occupation: Remote Ethnography of the Russo-Ukrainian War
Online Event 12:30 pm – 2:30 pm EDT/GMT-4
12:30 PM New York l 5:30 PM Vienna
The Open Society Hub for the Politics of the Anthropocene (OHPA) presents "Life in Occupation: Remote Ethnography of the Russo-Ukrainian War," a seminar with Vicente Ferraro. The role of bureaucrats, such as teachers, healthcare workers and police officers, has garnered increasing attention in public administration literature. Less explored is their role in wars and conflicts over territorial control. Ferraro's research aims to analyze how wars impact the work of such "street level bureaucrats" and the strategies they adopt to cope with adversities. This talk will focus on the war in Ukraine, the most intense conflict on European soil since World War II. We address education professionals as an SLB subgroup since schools and universities have become pivotal targets of Russian occupation forces— a cultural frontline instrumental in the efforts to legitimize territorial annexation and assimilate local inhabitants.
Vicente Ferraro is a postdoctoral researcher at the Getulio Vargas Foundation in Brazil and a visiting researcher at Centre for East European and International Studies (ZOiS-Berlin). He holds a degree in International Relations, a master’s degree in Applied Politics from the Higher School of Economics (Moscow), and a doctoral degree in Political Science from the University of São Paulo. His research focuses on: (a) the Russian occupation of Ukraine, particularly its impact on teachers, education professionals, and local public officials; (b) the wars in Chechnya and Ukraine and their effects on Russian society and politics.
Learn more and register to join online
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Tuesday, March 11, 2025
“I Snap, Therefore I Am”: IWT/CLASP Workshop on Freewriting and Participatory Photography
Online Event 9:00 am – 11:00 am EDT/GMT-4
9 AM New York l 2 PM Vienna
The Spring 2025 IWT/CLASP Workshop Series begins with “I Snap, Therefore I Am”: Freewriting and Participatory Photography.
Integrating more visual tools into an educator's toolbox not only fosters a more inclusive and participatory classroom environment but also enhances a crucial skill for the modern world – visual literacy. In an era when mobile photography is omnipresent and younger generations are increasingly focused on media presence, there is a growing need to explore how this phenomenon can be harnessed to encourage students to think more critically and meaningfully about their photography – to consider what they capture, why they do so, how they do it, and how their images align with professional practices and broader media discourses. In response to these evolving educational needs, this workshop will introduce participants to a range of pedagogical strategies, including freewriting prompts, in order to explore how the act of taking everyday photos shapes our perception of the world and our sense of identity.
Learn about the series and register here
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Friday, March 7, 2025
Climate Disinformation: European & Global Perspectives
Online Event 2:30 am – 12:00 pm EST/GMT-5
2:30 AM New York l 8:30 AM Vienna
The Open Society Hub for the Politics of the Anthropocene (OHPA) invites OSUN students to join its workshop on "Climate Disinformation: European & Global Perspectives." As climate change accelerates, so too does the spread of misinformation and disinformation designed to sow doubt, delay policy action, and erode public trust in science. From organized scepticism and conspiracy theories to digital disinformation campaigns and state-sponsored narratives, the fight against climate denialism is more relevant than ever. This workshop aims to bring together leading scholars and experts to explore how climate disinformation operates, how it spreads across different platforms and regions, and what strategies can be used to combat it. The program features three engaging panels covering the dynamics of climate skepticism, the role of social media in amplifying climate denialism, and the weaponization of climate conspiracies by political actors. Scholars from various disciplines will present research on topics ranging from Russian disinformation strategies to climate-related conspiracy theories in Turkey and Africa’s digital climate debates. The workshop will conclude with a keynote speech by Péter Krekó (Political Capital), who will offer insights into the broader political implications of climate disinformation.
Learn more and register to join online
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Sunday, February 23, 2025
Get Engaged Alumni Speaker Series: Promoting Community Service as a Form of Civic Engagement
Online Event 9:00 am – 3:00 pm EST/GMT-5
9 AM New York l 3 PM Vienna
2022 GE Alumnus Michael Mugisha leads this interactive workshop exploring the transformative power of community service as a pathway to active civic participation. Participants will learn how community engagement fosters social responsibility, builds stronger communities, and cultivates leadership skills.
The session will feature practical strategies for identifying community needs, organizing impactful service projects, and sustaining long-term civic involvement. Attendees will leave equipped with the knowledge and tools to champion community service initiatives and inspire others to join in building a more engaged and responsible society.
Michael Mugisha is a proud Ugandan and a graduate of Ashesi University in Ghana, where he earned a BSc in Business Administration. He is currently pursuing an MBA at Necmettin Erbakan University in Turkey, with the ultimate goal of becoming a Financial Controller. In 2022, Mughisha had the privilege of participating in the prestigious Get Engaged Conference in Kyrgyzstan, where he presented his community service initiative, The Berekuso Teaching Project, which aimed to enhance communication and public speaking skills among schoolchildren in the community.
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Thursday, February 20, 2025
The Periphery as Center and Center as Periphery
Online Event 12:30 pm – 2:00 pm EST/GMT-5
12:30 PM New York l 6:30 PM Vienna
The Hub for the Politics of the Anthropocene presents a seminar with Alexander Clarkson on "The Periphery as Center and Center as Periphery: EU Neighborhood and Accession Policy after EU, US and German Elections." Clarkson will examine how the position of so-called peripheral states in Europe is changing at a time when elections in the EU and US reflect growing instability in the global economic system. Though they still face significant imbalances after joining the EU, for new member states the accession framework marks the beginning of a process of dep-eripheralisation that provides them with access to strategic opportunities within a geopolitical center of power. This presentation will outline how such center-periphery dynamics within the EU as well as along its borders are experiencing a process of transformation whose trajectory is reshaping the balance of power around Europe.
Born in Canada, after completing his schooling in Hanover, Germany, Alex Clarkson studied Modern History at the University of Oxford. He has been the German and European Studies Lecturer for the European and International Studies Department at King’s College London since 2007.
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Sunday, February 16, 2025
Get Engaged Alumni Workshop: Leveraging Media & Outreach for Your Project Workshop
Online Event 9:00 am EST/GMT-5
9 AM New York l 3 PM Vienna
This workshop featuring 2022 and 2023 Get Engaged Alumnus Labby Ahshanul equips participants with practical strategies to amplify their projects through effective media use and impactful outreach events. Participants will learn how to harness the power of media to promote their projects and engage their target audience. Participants will also learn about designing and executing outreach events that leave a lasting impression and foster community engagement.
Labby Ahshanul is a dynamic youth leader and changemaker who has been actively involved in community engagement and development since 2012. He is Youth Coordinator at The Daily Star, Bangladesh’s leading English-language newspaper. With OSUN, he has participated twice in the Get Engaged conference and currently and has served as the Social Media and Outreach Manager of OSUN Global Commons. He is the founder of the BRAC University Research for Development Club, a pioneering initiative bridging young researchers with policymakers in the field of research and development.
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Thursday, February 6, 2025
Understanding the EU's Role in Forming the Loss and Damage Fund at COP27 in Egypt
11:30 am – 1:00 pm EST/GMT-5
11:30 AM New York l 5:30 PM Vienna
The Open Society Hub for the Politics of the Anthropocene presents a discussion on "Understanding the EU's role in Forming the "Loss and Damage Fund" at COP27 in Egypt."
Loss and Damage (L&D) usually refers to the excessive destruction caused by climate change effects despite mitigation and adaptation efforts. At UNFCCC COP27 in Egypt, a landmark deal was agreed to construct a fund that would distribute L&D funding to vulnerable countries from the Global South. The European Union was among the first from the Global North to accept the proposal but the establishment of this fund has long been a red line for the EU’s negotiation strategy.
This seminar with Michal Kolmaš asks why did the EU accept the proposal, even though it remained convinced that the existing infrastructure was better suited to deal with the issue? Kolmaš argues that the EU accepted the proposal for three different but interrelated reasons. These findings shed light on the often hidden mechanisms of climate diplomacy and provide a first hand experience of the Loss and Damage negotiations at COP27 in Egypt.
Michal Kolmaš is an Associate Professor of International Relations at the Metropolitan University Prague, Editor-in-Chief of the Czech Journal of International Relations (CJIR), and an Associate Editor of the Journal of International Relations and Development (JIRD). Previously, he was a visiting fellow at Umass Boston, Hokkaido University and Ritsumeikan APU in Japan.
Register to attend via Zoom
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Sunday, February 2, 2025
Get Engaged Alumni Workshop: Project Management Techniques for Civic Initiatives
Online Event 9:00 am EST/GMT-5
9 AM New York l 3 PM Vienna
This workshop featuring 2022 Get Engaged Alumna Hephzibah Emereole (Ashesi University) provides instruction on "Project Management Techniques for Civic Initiatives."
This workshop will help students learn the essential project management techniques to effectively plan, execute, and sustain their initiatives. This workshop aims to empower listeners with tools to set clear goals, manage resources, and navigate challenges, ensuring your civic engagement projects make a lasting impact.
Join via Zoom
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Sunday, January 26, 2025
Get Engaged Alumni Workshop: How to Enhance Cross-Cultural Communication Skills
Online Event 9:00 am EST/GMT-5
9 AM New York l 3 PM Vienna
This workshop featuring 2022 Get Engaged Alumna Nguyen Dang provides instruction on "How to Enhance Cross-Cultural Communication Skills."
This workshop delves into the vital role of cross-cultural communication in our interconnected world. Participants will uncover how cultural norms and communication styles shape interactions, identify common barriers to understanding, and learn actionable strategies to bridge cultural divides. By the end of the session, attendees will gain practical tools to navigate diverse environments confidently and foster inclusive, meaningful connections across cultures.
Nguyên Dang is a passionate advocate for youth empowerment and sustainable development. As a core member of YUU Organization, a youth-led nonprofit, she focuses on poverty reduction, cultural preservation, job orientation, and educational initiatives through impactful programs and training camps. As a Global Fellow, Nguyên supports OSUN Fulbright students to develop and sustain transformative social projects.
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Thursday, January 23, 2025
Vienna Basin: An Anthropocene Process Landscape in Central Europe
Online Event 11:30 am – 1:00 pm EST/GMT-5
11:30 AM New York l 5:30 PM Vienna
The Hub for the Politics of the Anthropocene (OHPA) presents a seminar with Benjamin Steininger, discussing the Vienna Basin and its oil and gas fields as a showcase for how to deal with Nature/Culture-History in modernity and Anthropocene. Observing the history of oil and gas exploration in the region, Steininger will trace at least four different versions of experience with petro-modernity and Anthropocene-agency (international capitalism, Nazi-war-economy, Soviet imperialism, social democratic-catholic petro-modernity). The talk argues that it takes this type of bottom up field work and a comparative 'petrocultures' or 'Anthropocene-comparision' as performed in the 'Atlas of Petromodernity' to interpret the planetary agency of the so called 'Anthropos'.
Benjamin Steininger is a historian of science and technology and a curator. He works as a postdoc at the Cluster of Excellence UniSysCat at TU-Berlin and at the MPI of Geoanthropology in Jena. His main Anthropocene research fields are industrial chemistry and petro-modernity. From 2012 to 2016 he led a participatory research and collection project on 100 years of oil and gas in the Vienna basin. His open access book with Alexander Klose, "Atlas der Petromoderne'", was published in German and Russian in 2020 and in 2024 in an enlarged American version with an introduction by Stephanie LeMenager.
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Tuesday, January 21, 2025
"Talk More. Fight Less": A Demonstration of the SWAY Chat Platform
Online Event 3:00 pm EST/GMT-5
3 PM New York l 9 PM Vienna
The Bard Center for the Study of Hate presents an online opportunity to try out SWAY, a new AI-based platform for engaging difficult conversations. BCSH recently hosted a webinar on how AI be used to reduce hate, deepen student discussions of divisive topics, and improve teaching and learning.
Simon Cullen and Nicholas DiBella of Carnegie Mellon University discussed and demonstrated their AI-scaffolded group chat platform for students called SWAY, which was chronicled in Inside Higher Ed. Cullen and DiBella are now offering an opportunity for OSUN faculty, students, staff to try out this new technology.
SWAY connects students with differing perspectives into one-on-one chats and facilitates better discussions between them. Inspired by John Stuart Mill's radical view that engaging with opposing perspectives is an essential tool for improving reasoning and solving complex problems, SWAY aims to create online environments where students can discuss controversial issues more openly and constructively.
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Sunday, January 19, 2025
Get Engaged Alumni Workshop: Finding Scholarship Opportunities During Uncertain Times
Online Event 10:30 am EST/GMT-5
10:30 AM New York l 4:30 PM Vienna
This workshop featuring 2020 Get Engaged Alumnus Wisdom Kalu (Ashesi University) provides instruction on "Finding Scholarship Opportunities During Uncertain Times."
This workshop will discuss practical ways to find scholarship opportunities using social media and the My Scholarship Info website. It will give students practical advice on how to search and apply for these scholarships anonymously, specifically for those applying from troubled areas around the world.
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Thursday, January 16, 2025
War and the City: Urban Agglomerations in Russia’s Conquest of Donbas
Online Event 11:30 am – 1:00 pm EST/GMT-5
11:30 AM New York l 5:30 PM Vienna
CEU's Hub for the Politics of the Anthropocene presents an academic seminar with Serhiy Kudelia, Baylor University, on "Urban Agglomerations in Russia’s Conquest of Donbas." Since its inception in 2014, the Russo-Ukrainian war has been mainly fought in the most densely urbanized and heavily industrialized region of Ukraine – the Donbas.
Professor Kudelia will examine how the urban and industrial landscapes of the region affected the course of the war and, in turn, were transformed as a result. It will explain how the density of urban agglomerations of Donbas enabled quick removal of Ukraine’s sovereign control over the region in spring of 2014, while its dilapidated industrial base turned into a vital material and ideological resource for the nascent separatist movement. With the start of the full-scale invasion in 2022, high urban density of the region became, by contrast, an important structural obstacle for further Russian conquest.
During the seminar Kudelia will draw on his field research in the towns of Donbas prior to 2022 and on his forthcoming book Seize the City, Undo the State: The Inception of Russia’s War on Ukraine (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2025).
Serhiy Kudelia is Associate Professor of Political Science at Baylor University, where he teaches courses on political regimes, state-building and political violence, and Ukrainian and Russian politics. His research, published in numerous peer-reviewed journals, deals with various aspects of politics in Ukraine, the armed conflict in Donbas and Russo-Ukrainian war. He earlier held teaching and research positions at the University of St. Andrews (UK), the University of Basel (Switzerland), George Washington University (US), Johns Hopkins University (US), and the National University ‘Kyiv-Mohyla Academy’ (Ukraine).
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