On 24 October, a meeting with scholarship holders of the Lane Kirkland Scholarship Program, offered by the Leaders of Change Foundation, took place at the NAWA headquarters in Warsaw. Grantees undertaking a 9-month internship co-financed by our Agency come from countries like Georgia, Ukraine, Belarus and Armenia. Most of them have a very good command of Polish, despite having spent only two months in Poland.

Over the course of the meeting students spoke very highly about the level of education offered by Polish HEIs. They emphasized their very high regard for Polish lecturers who are not only theoreticians but also practitioners in their respective fields, adopting both perspectives to best impart the knowledge to their students. They also gave praise to the infrastructure and furnishing of lecture halls. We keep our fingers crossed for all the scholarship holders and hope that their time in Poland will be fruitful. 

The Kirkland Program offers scholarships for one-year complementary studies at Polish HEIs. Scholarships are granted to young luminaries with higher education diplomas, hailing from 9 countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia and Ukraine, who are interested in the development of democracy, economy and civil society in their countries and in the region.

The Kirkland scholarship lasts 9.5 months and begins with the orientation and preparatory program. After the end of the orientation program, the grantees spend two semesters in one of the five academic centres pursuing an individual academic program. The Polish language courses organized in particular cities are also a fixed point of the academic program.