Romania took hold of my heart in 2015 and since then has consumed my mind and soul. As with any genuine commitment, my relationship with this beautiful, complex country has grown and deepened over time as I have learned of its many tragedies, as well as its many triumphs. I have surrendered myself to Romania. [...] As I continue my Romanian journey, I marvel over the resiliency and fortitude of the people. I am fortunate to have developed close relationships, familial in many ways, with many Romanians. And I am eternally grateful to have been granted a Fulbright and honored to become part of this amazing community.
SOLIDarity EXperiences through the Eyes of Children Workshop
With the support of the Fulbright Alumni Institutional Development Grant, on April 11th, 2024, a wide-ranging group featuring researchers, teachers, NGO representatives, and curriculum developers gathered for a thought-provoking and engaging hybrid workshop. This meeting marked a milestone in a research initiative funded by the Romanian-U.S. Fulbright Commission and centered on the theme “SOLIDarity EXperiences through the Eyes of Children (SOLIDEX).” The SOLIDEX project aims to examine how children in Romania and the United States understand the evolving contexts of solidarity.
The research project on which the workshop was based started in May 2023 with the focus on understanding how children across various regions of Romania and the U.S aged 11 to 13 perceive and understand their world, influenced by war, migration, pandemics, natural disasters, climate change, and more. From October 2023 until March 2024, the research team carried out workshops with children from seven diverse communities, including rural and urban populations, varying economic status, ethnic groups, and schools accommodating displaced students from Ukraine. Utilizing participatory methods aligned with the principles of engaging children as competent social actors and fostering dialogic learning the researchers used photo-voice, photo elicitation, observation, drawings, collages, storytelling, forum theater activities, individual and group interviews, interpretation, and re-writing of AI narratives. These approaches created a shared dialogic space of knowledge production and facilitated the creation of artifacts by children.
During the workshop on the 11th of April, participants had the opportunity to engage with the artifacts and ideas generated by children, alongside accessing valuable instructional resources for teachers, researchers, and community activists. These resources included: workshop guidelines and video recordings of the experiences. Furthermore, the meeting served as a platform for discussing future collaboration opportunities. The workshop guidelines are aimed to support and empower other teachers, youth workers, and researchers to use and conduct dialogic learning and participatory research activities in their respective contexts.
The project team comprises researchers from three Romanian universities and one American university. Building upon previous Fulbright experiences of Dr. Cătălina Ulrich Hygum (2011-2012) and Dr. Luisa-Maria Rosu (2014-2015) at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign and the University of Bucharest, respectively, the team includes Dr. Leyla Safta-Zecheria from the West University of Timișoara, Dr. Marcela Slusarciuc from “Ștefan cel Mare” University of Suceava (Fulbright scholar 2018-2019), Dr. Elena Ungureanu, and PhD student Mădălina Coza from the University of Bucharest.
In addition to presentations from the team members, the workshop featured guest speakers, including Professor Lucian Ciolan (vice-rector of the University of Bucharest and president of the Romanian Association of Educational Research), Dr. Sarai Coba-Rodriguez (University of Illinois at Chicago, director of Diverse Families and School Readiness Lab), and Dr. Călin Rus (director of the Intercultural Institute of Timisoara and Teaching Associate at West University of Timișoara).
The team will continue the project with workshops in U.S. and Romanian schools.