Nova Ukraine transferred 0 to the family of Mykola Pankiv, a Heavenly Hundred hero, who was shot dead by a sniper on February 20, 2014. The picture shows the receipt written by his widow and her photo.
“Today I visited the family of Mykola Pankiv, a Hero of Nebesna Sotnya. His wife Lesya met me in front of the gate of a beautiful, immaculate house. You could tell that every brick, every little part of the house was laid not only with hard work but also with love. At the same time you could tell that the renovation was far from being complete. Mykola was planning to finish everything when he would return. It didn’t happen. He died from a bullet of a sniper on February 20, 2014, on Instytutska Street. Now, she will have to take care of everything by herself. Mykola’s son, a nine-year-old boy, joined our conversation. It is hard to look the kid in the eye If adults can control their emotions, kids cannot. I was now looking at a sad boy, who was hugging his mom for support.
– I have two kids. I also have a daughter who is 13. Mykola raised them as true patriots. They both do karate, and the son also does martial hopak (*Ukrainian dance). I offered her to sign up the kids for summer camps that were organized by volunteers for children of Maydan Heros.
– I’m scared- was the widow’s simple answer.
Lesya is now afraid of everything: afraid of separatists, worries that they can hurt her children, punishing for their father.
At the end she thanked for the money. I told her to contact me if she needed any help. Lesya refused, saying she would not need any. I cast a glance at the front yard, incomplete house renovation, a couple of little kids, and realized what Mykola was like and why he was on Maydan. He believed that changes in the country could be accomplished only if you made your personal input. He didn’t stay in his village. He left his kids and the wife and went to Kyiv to change hard struggle to survive for peaceful, fair and decent life in the country.
Unfortunately, those who deserve to live the most, die. Mykola was 39 years old. Eternal glory to the Hero!”
– Ivanna, a Nova Ukraine’s contact in Lviv Oblast (*Region).
‘Language and Thinking’ Program Prepares Young Ukrainians for Future Leadership
With Nova Ukraine’s support, Bard College leads writing- and discussion-filled workshops on the topic of justice Students from across Ukraine developed critical reading, writing, and civic leadership skills in a new program this summer supported by Nova Ukraine. The tuition-free, residential program, called Language and Thinking Kyiv, was based on Bard College’s Institute for Writing and Thinking approach to learning and was led by students and faculty members from the school. A total of 29 high school students completed the three-week program, which focused on the theme of “justice.” Students read and discussed texts written by Václav Havel, Lesia Ukrainka, Martin Luther King Jr., and others, and zeroed in on topics such as freedom, responsibility, and dignity. The students worked in small, immersive workshops and practiced a variety of writing formats, including free writing, loop writing, and process writing—all in English—and then shared and discussed their work with their classmates to examine and refine their own thought processes. One example of their assignments was the use of dialectical notebooks, in which students write down their thoughts about a text they had read together, then pass their notebook to another student to add their perspective.
