Representatives of Volodymyr Dahl East Ukrainian National University and Mariupol State University held a consultation meeting with Brian Milakowski, an expert in fundraising.
It is one of the consultations provided by the project “Strengthening Fundraising Capacity for Displaced Universities”, which is implemented with the financial support of the Fulbright Program and the NGO “Prostir Foundation”.
Brian Milakowski shared his own fundraising experience and answered questions from the project participants.
The cooperation between Volodymyr Dahl East Ukrainian National University and Brian Milakowski began after the first evacuation of Sievierodonetsk. It was thanks to Brian Milakowski’s active participation in the university that several successful development projects were implemented. More projects were planned for implementation. During the second evacuation, Mr. Bryan significantly helped with fundraising to organize the evacuation of university students and staff, their families, and residents of the Luhansk region.
The expert outlined a range of topics that may be of interest to funders, such as environmental issues, gender issues, etc., although trendy problem-solving areas are not a guarantee of success in finding funding, as funders tend to act rationally and study the applicant’s readiness to address the problem well.
It is impossible to predict the actions of a funder at the stage of planning to allocate funds, as the final decision depends on many factors. Much depends on the behavior of the applicant.
Answering questions from the participants, the expert advised to focus on projects, for example, joint projects with foreign universities, in which the Ukrainian side will act as a partner. The participants discussed areas of cooperation that may be of interest to foreign partners in terms of the future restoration of the de-occupied territories of Ukraine.
According to most participants, universities will be the first places to start restoring the territories after Ukraine’s victory. Therefore, it is necessary to develop recovery plans and look for capable partnerships for future development.