About Us

The “Ukrainian Bildung Network” NGO is driven by the group of educators:

  • Serhii Chumachenko – NGO Founder, the leading Ukrainian researcher of Bildung, trainer
  • Mihail Krikunov – NGO Founder and President, professor and consultant in business and management
  • Anastasia Nekrasova – consultant, trainer, coach, facilitator and a learning designer

Among Founders of our NGO, there are:

  • Elena Tochilina – leading trainer and sense-maker
  • Yurii Pyvovarenko – Head of the Council of our NGO, IT professional, project manager
  • Roman Dakus – Technician, Farmer, Grower who studied in Denmark Folk High School

We are a team of like-minded people who aim to implement a Folk High Schools network in Ukraine and launch the process of building of adult Ukrainians.

Listen to the podcast “Bildung, Identity, and Nordic Inspiration in Ukraine” with our cofounders and a member of our NGO.

Contact us

  • Message to our Facebook-page or to our Facebook-profiles mentioned above.
  • Email to us to bildung.in.ua[at]gmail.com

Folk High School “Vovchok”

Serhii Chumachenko has established Folk High School “Vovchok” in Chernihivska oblast in Ukraine. There were renovation works. As of now, Serhii with his team have completed the first part of the renovation works at the school. So, :

  • 5 rooms for living,
  • 8 beds
  • kitchen,
  • showers,
  • toilets,
  • washbasins,
  • and a house with two classrooms

Serhii works on development of two types of learning programs:
1) For the development of the local community
2) For adults from outside the community – learning for active conscious citizenship

See more details on the Folk High School “Vovchok” website.

Here are the necessary conditions to let the idea of ​​Nordic Folk High Schools work effectively in Ukraine:

1. A fixed location for the school’s activities and the most simplified access to the necessary knowledge and practices.

2. This process should be, first of all, focused on the needs of the group and its life experience, even to the detriment of expert assessment of the “quality” (the word is not accidentally put in quotes) of ideas, the depth of immersion in contexts, and the process. The main criterion for assessing quality is the involvement of the group and the desire to continue.

3. It is this approach that makes the formation of an active civic position natural.

4. Unfortunately, such schools, in the modern Ukrainian context, cannot arise from a decision “from the top.” Their robotic ability depends on the enthusiasm of the initiators (founders) and the supporting environment. Respectively –

4. The sustainability of a network of such schools can be ensured through the consolidation of the efforts of international institutions and the emergence of a fund financed by business and interested citizens.

Our Partners

International

  • The Global Network for Folk high school Research (GNFR) has been established to develop greater interaction between academics and practitioners interested in empirical research on folk high school pedagogy.
  • The Association of Folk High Schools in Denmark (FFD) – The Danish folk high schools are organized by an association known as “FFD”, seated in Copenhagen. FFD is the national organizing body of all of the 70 folk high schools in Denmark. The purpose of FFD is to work for the folk high school idea, and to create good and free conditions for the development of this type of school.
  • University of South-Eastern Norway (USN) – Has Faculty of Humanities, Sports and Educational Science with Department of Educational Science which conducts the Norwegian folk high school teachers’ education program.
  • Ekskäret Foundation. The mission of the Ekskäret Foundation is to both to make sense of the world we create and allow brave spaces for people to explore and work on their inner growth.
  • Nordic Bildung – think tank which works for the leaps forward, without the riots and wars; for freedom, for democracy and for human rights, now and in the future.
  • European Bildung Network – provides a platform for citizens and organizations to actively promote Bildung and empower Europeans to imagine and create the best version of Europe for everyone.
  • DVV International in Ukraine – Representative Office of DVV International in Ukraine which started its operations in 2010 with the purpose to promote adult education as a key to public welfare and sustainable development.

Ukrainian

Also, we involve volunteers for translating English articles on bildung and Folk High Schools.

Our Projects

Ukrainian Library of Bildung

Elena Tochilina, Serhii Chumachenko and Yurii Pyvovarenko coordinate translations of books about bildung and Folk High Schools into Ukrainian.

Extend work of the Vovchok Folk High School

Serhii Chumachenko with his team extends activities of the first Folk High School in Ukraine.

Study Circle on Bildung (completed)

Yurii Pyvovarenko and Iryna Sharpylo coordinate the first Study Circle which is aimed to better understand what is bildung while discussions of the Ukrainian translation of The Nordic Secret book.

Researches on Bildung for Ukraine

Serhii Chumachenko finds new information and data on bildung which helps to implement it in Ukraine.

You are welcome to support us financially

Legal Entity: NGO “UKRAINIAN BILDUNG NETWORK”
Enterprise Code: 44527701
IBAN: UА313510050000026005879150505;
Purpose of payment: Voluntary donation for statutory activities, from Full Name, Tax Identification Number.
Address: Horlivska street, 38/40 of.154, Kyiv, 02091, Ukraine
Bank Name: Public Joint Stock Company “UkrSibbank”;
Bank code: 351005
BENEFICIARY BANK for EUR (JSC “UkrSibbank”): 07205696;
UKRSIBBANK; Andriivska Str. 2/12, Kyiv, Ukraine; SWIFT Code: KHABUA2K.
INTERMEDIARY BANK: BNP PARIBAS SA; Paris, France; SWIFT Code: BNPAFRPP.

Here are the necessary conditions to let the idea of ​​Nordic Folk High Schools work effectively in Ukraine:

1. A fixed location for the school’s activities and the most simplified access to the necessary knowledge and practices.

2. This process should be, first of all, focused on the needs of the group and its life experience, even to the detriment of expert assessment of the “quality” (the word is not accidentally put in quotes) of ideas, the depth of immersion in contexts, and the process. The main criterion for assessing quality is the involvement of the group and the desire to continue.

3. It is this approach that makes the formation of an active civic position natural.

4. Unfortunately, such schools, in the modern Ukrainian context, cannot arise from a decision “from the top.” Their robotic ability depends on the enthusiasm of the initiators (founders) and the supporting environment. Respectively –

4. The sustainability of a network of such schools can be ensured through the consolidation of the efforts of international institutions and the emergence of a fund financed by business and interested citizens.

Our Results

We have reports for 2022 and 2023 in Ukrainian language.

2021

On February 25, we launched the Facebook page Bildung in Ukraine (in Ukrainian and Russian languages), and since then we have been publishing information about Bildung and Folk High Schools on it almost every week. At the end of 2021, we have about 530 subscribers on this page.

Meanwhile, in 2021, the number of members of our Facebook group exceeded 600.

Together with our partner Cowo.guru, we recorded a video presentation about the Folk High Schools (watch this Russian-language video below on this page), which has already been viewed more than 1,800 views. The video was published on March 10, 2021.

On May 8, we held an online forum dedicated to Bildung and Folk High Schools – watch videos and presentations.

On October 7, the Ukrainian translation of The Nordic Secret book was presented at the Urban Space 500 in Kyiv during the 6-th Book Club organized by Valerii Pekar. Our co-founders – Serhii Chumachenko and Mikhail Krikunov took part in the discussion of the book. Watch the timeline of the video of the meeting and its transcript. This video has been viewed about 1000 times. We thank very much to Valerii Pekar for the organizing and moderating this!

On October 20, we launched the first Study Circle (see English-written article about Study Cirlces) and since then we have held several meetings to discuss the first two parts of the the Ukrainian translation of The Nordic Secret book. Meetings of this Study Circle continued in 2022. We publish photo reports of these meetings in our Facebook group.

On December 22, 2021, our NGO, the Ukrainian Bildung Network, was registered.

During 2021, volunteeres translated most of the English-written sections of the anthology on Bildung. We still do not have the strength to read them all and prepare them for publication… We thank you very much to our translators for the large amount of work done:

  • Nikita Zhuk
  • Anna Rohalska
  • Halyna Yarmolenko
  • Daria Yemets
  • Irina Guziy
  • Iryna Sharpylo

2020

We have declared that 2020 is the year of Bildung in Ukraine to tell the widest possible audience about the social, economic and political value of lifelong development.

Our initiative group held several face-to-face and online meetings to coordinate their actions and develop a Communication Strategy.

Serhii Chumachenko drafted the first version of the Concept of the Ukrainian Folk High School (UFHS).

Students of the Institute of Philology of the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv draft-translated for us from Swedish more than 110 pages of the Clara Nankler’s book “Folkbildning and Solidarity”. And now we are working to complete the translation of this book and publish it. This will allow as many Ukrainians as possible to learn about examples of international activities carried out by the Swedish Folk High Schools (FHS) and to feel the power of education in such informal education institutions.

Our Facebook group distributed more than 40 articles about folk high schools, Bildung and Scandinavian countries.

The number of members of this Facebook group reached 480 people.

This site was created and filled with the first blog posts and Knowledge Base articles.

We created a page about Bildung in Ukrainian Wikipedia.