The “Solidarity with Ukraine” programme was announced by NAWA earlier this year as a response to the Russian military aggression against Ukraine. Its goal was to support the academic community of Ukraine, mainly focusing on students and doctoral students who had to leave Ukraine as refugees and decided to stay in Poland. Initial actions were planned for the March - September 2022 period, but already in May, during a conference with the same name, organized by NAWA and the University of Gdansk, it became clear that additional support is required.

Thanks to recent changes provided by the Ministry of Higher Education and Science in Poland, NAWA is now introducing the next phase of the programme aiming to support the academic community of Ukraine. It will include a broad range of activities that Polish universities – also members of European University Alliances – will be able to offer to their academic partners from Ukraine, such as student exchange, study visits, participation in various conferences, creation of new up-to-date study material and development of a quality assurance system for education and research. With the introduction of the new phase, 18 Polish universities will be taking part in the initiative with a budget of at least 500 000 PLN (approximately 100 000 EUR).