On Thursday, April 24, 2025, several Seton Hall faculty and students participated in a virtual conference, organized by their partners at Borys Grinchenko Kyiv Metropolitan University in Kyiv, Ukraine. The theme of the 13th All-Ukrainian Young Scholars Conference was poignant and timely: "Ukrainian Past: Wars for Identity and Independence." The conference attracted dozens of participants from across Ukraine. Ukrainian faculty and students delivered scholarly presentations, interspersed with first-person accounts of struggle and survival in a time of war.
Seton Hall University enjoys a long-standing partnership with Borys Grinchenko University — an academic relationship that, over the course of the past three years and in the aftermath of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, has blossomed into a real friendship. Professor James Daly, of the Department of Educational Studies, Professor Maxim Matusevich, of the Department of History, and Professor Nathaniel Knight, also of the Department of History, delivered welcoming remarks and statements of support at the opening session of the conference.
The conference also attracted contributions from Seton Hall students. Four students presented their research, which will also appear in the forthcoming issue of the Young Scholars Grinchenko – Seton International Journal. Clare Dueweke, Allison Bodaken, Avery Kachmarsky, and Madeline Kruszczynski, all students from the School of Diplomacy, shared their work on a vast array of relevant subjects: the rise of Ukrainian nationalism, the role of religion in the Ukraine war, the history of the Crimean Tatars and the analysis of Russian tactics in the suppression of Ukrainian independence.
Seton Hall University faculty and students remain committed to a long tradition of fruitful collaboration with Ukrainian partners.
