Insha Osvita report 2025

We opened last year’s foreword by noting that, in a time of war, counting achievements can feel particularly futile. It is neither a moment for self-congratulation nor for juggling numbers, so once again we will try to keep this text concise.

As in the previous year, we continue to work in Ukraine, fine-tuning a decentralised perspective, avoiding Kyiv-centricity and steering clear of aligning ourselves with business interests. As before, we carry on with our core programmes — Culture Helps, ВІЛЬНО/VILNO, Scattered Communities, and visits for European cultural professionals to Ukraine. We continue to work with memory culture and cultural policies. We remain committed to our key themes for the long term and prioritise programmes that unfold over several iterations in order to strengthen their impact.

What has changed is that we are now structuring our portfolio of activities and revisiting our strategy. We are taking a more critical look at the approaches we use — facilitation in particular — and, at the time of writing this foreword, we are pausing the previous format of the trainers’ group that carried our name. We are planning to relaunch facilitation schools and educational formats for a new generation of cultural managers, and we are increasingly engaging with the themes of death and mourning. We continue to strengthen and gradually expand the team — this year, Bozhena Pelenska joined us as programme and operations director.

So, all is well at Insha Osvita; and more broadly, sorrow and joy remain intertwined — and we embrace you.

Olga Diatel, Alona Karavai, Vasyl Kulevchuk
(Board of Insha Osvita)