As a member of the Scholar at Risk Network, The University of Winnipeg is proud to be working toward hosting a visiting Afghan Scholar for two years through the “Placement, Preservation and Perseverance: Afghan At-Risk Scholars, Activists, and Students” project.
Donor support has already played a critical role in leveraging this opportunity: our goal is to raise a total of $50,000 in donor support to go towards scholars’ direct needs and expenses such as salary, benefits, professional development, research costs, books, conferences and settlement expenses.
The visiting scholar will be hosted by UWinnipeg’s Global College and provided support as they transition to our campus. The University will make all necessary arrangements (housing, immigration paperwork, arranging faculty mentors etc.) for the scholar and their dependents.
The University of Winnipeg believes that post-secondary institutions have a responsibility to advocate for academic freedom. By hosting threatened scholars at our institution, we are providing safety and a voice to scholars suffering grave threats to their lives, liberty and well-being.
Your support makes all the difference; please consider making a gift today!
About ‘Placement, Preservation and Perseverance: Afghan At-Risk Scholars, Activists and Students’
In partnership with Carleton University, the University of British Columbia, and the Government of Canada (IDRC), this project supports scholars, civil society actors, activists, and journalists from Afghanistan who have been forced to flee, especially women and ethnic minorities. Bringing together 12 core participant-leaders over two years, the project seeks to empower their integration into new homes and, into scholarly and civil society communities and to re-ignite research on the past, present and future of Afghanistan. The project provides wrap-around support for their resettlement to preserve and facilitate knowledge production in ways that contribute substantially to the future of the Afghan people and society.
About Scholars at Risk (SAR)
SAR is an international network of higher education institutions and individuals working to protect threatened scholars, prevent attacks on higher education, and promote academic freedom and related values. Scholar candidates are nominated to SAR by member institutions or partners, or may apply directly. Network members always retain final selection authority over whether to invite any candidate and over which candidates to consider. Network members are also encouraged to identify candidates themselves through their faculty and other links by nominating cases to SAR.
This program complements the Government of Canada’s refugee resettlement efforts by welcoming threatened scholars to higher education institutions as temporary professors, researchers, lecturers, visiting scholars, post-docs, graduate fellows or students. These individuals are looking for a safe haven to continue their work for a period of time in the hopes to return to their home countries when it is safe to do so.
Background
All over the world, we are seeing countries pushed into economic and social crises by political turmoil. In 2021, the world watched as Afghanistan erupted in civil unrest and uncertainty. In the time since, tens of thousands of Afghans have been forced to flee, often by taking desperate measures. Many others who want to flee are still seeking safe passage out of the country. Countless Afghans remain at risk of being targeted for their past work or association with coalition forces, Afghanistan’s former government, international development programs, media, civil society, and other organizations promoting human rights. The SAR Network is responding to urgent requests from individual Afghan scholars, activists, and civil society leaders—with particular concern for women and ethnic and religious minorities. This triggered the University of Winnipeg’s decision to join the SAR Network although we remain open to supporting an eligible at-risk scholar from other parts of the world as well.
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Our need: to raise $50,000 to support costs such as salary, benefits, professional development, research costs, books, conferences and settlement expenses and to also provide support in other critical ways—from mental health and health care services to relocation costs and support for family members.
*Our crowdfund page does not show live gifts at this time and is manually updated. Please keep checking back to see our effort grow. We apologize for this technical inconvenience.
All gifts made are tax-deductible.
If you do not wish to make a gift online, you can also send a cheque to:
The University of Winnipeg Foundation
901 - 491 Portage Avenue
Winnipeg, Manitoba R3B 2E4 Canada
Call toll-free: 1-866-394-6050