This year, the IFSK faculty celebrates its 25th anniversary. Olena SUSHKOVA (dean) tells us how the faculty has changed over this time, what challenges it has overcome and what it is proud of today.

The IFSK faculty turned 25 on 15 March 2025? Olena Mykolaivna, how did it all start and how did it develop further? 

– It all started with the logic of SumDU development. We know from the history of our university that it was organized and improved for a long time as a technical educational institution. But a classical university, which is what it became in 1993, required a sectoral, so to speak, “humanization.” And further development of specialties required it. Therefore, on 15 March 2000, the Faculty of Humanities was established at SumDU. In 2011, it was reclassified as the Faculty of Foreign Philology and Social Communications. At the very beginning, it specialized in training translators and lawyers, and later joined journalists. Creation and further development of the faculty was a significant step in establishment of SumDU as a classical university.

In order to strengthen the potential of young people, the faculty gradually expanded its educational, scientific, and cultural range of services. So, new specialties and programs were created.

Emergence of each new specialty in the faculty structure was both an important event and a certain stage in its development. This contributed to the faculty expansion, increase in number of students, professionalism of the teaching staff, and fundamentalization of the socio-humanitarian vector of the university’s development in general.

Introduction of Master’s and PhD programs have strengthened the scientific and pedagogical components.

We actively involve leading industry specialists and experts in the educational process. The level of such work is growing and improving every year. Closer cooperation with employers, and thus wider practical training of students, is facilitated by practice-oriented projects. It would be impossible to list them all, so I’ll name a few: “Travel Office”, “Social Oscar”, “Studio PROFI”, “Media World Leads to the Universe”, “AlterEgo”, “Sumy Journalism in Faces”, workshops with graduates and specialists, etc. The work of our centers is in the same vein: it concerns German, PR consulting, regional security, gender, social studies, family support, etc.

Large-scale international projects implemented at all our departments contribute to enrichment of the educational and scientific experience of teachers and students. International cooperation and opening of new opportunities for professional training of young people are also related to this.

It is worth talking about improving the material and technical base, opening classrooms with the latest equipment: language rooms, TV and radio studios, computer classes, multimedia laboratories.

In general, our faculty is a living organism. So, we gain and lose something.

Thank you for the short and concise excursion into the past. But the present is more interesting. What has marked the last years?

– The most important thing is our faith in the victory of Ukraine for independent existence and development. This is the greatest aim.

Serious challenges began with the coronavirus pandemic. It forced students to leave the classroom and sit at their computers and laptops. Before we could recover from this shock, a full-scale war broke out in Ukraine. Nevertheless, the faculty lives and grows, looking for opportunities for development where others see a crisis.

There is a demand for IFSK specialties, which is manifested both in the interest of applicants and in the requests of employers.

Spirit of our faculty, sense of unity, mutual support, and desire for joint development remain unchanged. IFSK students are a big family, a community of young and talented people who are ready to rebuild our country and change the world.

In 2023, for the first time in the university history, SumDU was ranked in Social Sciences (top 501-600) by the Times Higher Education ranking. This is a significant contribution of our departments.

According to the 2024 results, we are the only structural unit where state-contracted research and scientific grant projects are implemented at each department. The faculty is implementing 3 grants from the National Research Foundation of Ukraine. In 2025, we received funding for state-budget research under the main competition. For four years in a row, basic funding has been successfully implemented in the scientific direction “Humanities and Arts”. I emphasize only 5 Ukrainian institutions have received funding in this direction.

The second international conference “Strategic Innovations in Social Communications and Foreign Philology in Crisis Conditions” is planned for May.

We have two professional journals: “Image” and “Philological Treatises”.

Have any traditions that were started at the beginning of the faculty existence been preserved?

– Let us mention the Faculty Day celebration. In the days when lecture rooms were filled with students, these were large-scale celebrations with a number of various events and a grand concert. But it was not only about the concert itself – preparation for it turned into a large-scale process that united students and teachers. After the “Golden Integral”, the best numbers were selected, the students independently created invitations and brought guests of honor, organized various fairs. Although it is not yet possible to restore the traditional concert in its usual format, students continue to support the faculty spirit by holding various events and games.

Time dictates its own conditions, but it is important that the faculty develops, modernizes and maintains a unique atmosphere. We are looking forward to the return of traditional events that have always been the soul of faculty life!

If you were asked to characterize the faculty in one phrase, what would you say?

‒ The best faculty in the galaxy!

Name one of the most vivid memories associated with the faculty life.

‒ 1 September: we congratulate our freshmen. 2 July: we see off our graduates. And so every year. This is really the most vivid impression.

In order to meet freshmen and see off graduates, you need to interest applicants. What specialties and educational programs does the faculty currently offer? What are the plans?

‒ The IFSK faculty trains specialists at three levels of education: Bachelor, Master, PhD. Bachelor comprises 6 specialties and 7 educational programs: Philology, Journalism, Psychology, Social Work, Management of Socio-Cultural Activities, Secondary Education. Master includes Journalism, Languages, Organizational Psychology, Political Science. PhD has such programs as Journalism, Philology, Philosophy.

The faculty is actively working on implementation of certificate programs aimed at formation of additional professional competencies and practical skills that are in demand in the modern labor market. The first students in Cyber-Journalism and Visual Communications in Advertising and PR have been graduated. The certificate programs “Legal Translation” (Bachelor) and “Psychology of Resocialization of War Veterans” (Master) have unfolded.

It is also significant that two educational programs are offered for students to study in English, and foreigners are currently studying in them.

Does the faculty cooperate with international universities? What opportunities are there for students within academic mobility?

‒ Yes, of course it cooperates. Despite war challenges, the faculty is carrying out systematic work to strengthen internationalization. International virtual mobility is developing, which is gaining relevance through the technologies of international collaborative online learning – COIL. It involves creation of a joint curriculum with a foreign higher education institution on an agreed topic and its simultaneous implementation with the involvement of teachers and applicants from SumDU and a foreign university. This approach gains increasing importance in the European higher education space and the world as a whole. In cooperation with the university’s partners (Polytechnic Colleges of Camarines Sur – Philippines, Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz – Germany, Abai Kazakh National Pedagogical University – Kazakhstan, University of Liverpool – UK, College of New Jersey – USA, Riga Technical University – Latvia), we have implemented a number of virtual mobility projects. We even have a trilateral virtual academic mobility course with Moroccan institutions and the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poland, where students work in international teams, developing cross-cultural communication skills and mastering knowledge of the Sustainable Development Goals.

We are currently collaborating with the University of Shuaib Doukkali from Morocco in the scientific research on the AI impact on quality of English language learning. This university is also our partner and co-organizer of an international conference.

In addition to virtual academic mobility, our students are actively involved in physical academic mobility programs under the Erasmus+ program. The geography of partner universities is quite wide: Tartu, Riga, Flensburg, as well as universities in Slovakia, Canada, Sweden, and the USA. I would like to separately note the active involvement of our applicants of all levels and teachers in cooperation with the University of Liverpool within the Unity Initiative. In particular, postgraduate students have dual scientific supervision of their dissertations: from our university and Liverpool in their specialty. Teachers also actively participate in summer schools, in the scientific mentoring “Science for Ukraine”.

Of course, it is difficult to even list all partner universities with which cooperation is carried out in submission and implementation of scientific and educational projects in the Erasmus +, Horizon programs, from the governments of a number of countries. All Europe is covered here.

The teaching staff is the heart of any faculty. What unique specialists work at your faculty, and how does the faculty contribute to their professional development?

‒ The teaching staff is truly our heart and pride. The faculty brings together teachers, scientists, practitioners in journalism and communication, language and literary studies, linguistics, linguodidactics, translation studies, psychology, political science, philosophy, social work, management of socio-cultural activities, etc. Our scientific and pedagogical workers successfully perform several roles at the same time: they teach, engage in scientific research, publish monographs and articles, participate in international projects, are experts in fields, conduct various trainings, educate students as true citizens, successfully practice in their fields. They also belong to scientific communities, methodological commissions, professional unions of various levels, are laureates of prestigious competitions and awards. It confirms the high level of their skill and dedication to their work. The faculty actively implements innovative approaches to learning (interactive courses, digital technologies and interdisciplinary projects).

The teaching staff comprises bright individuals with diverse talents and hobbies. It is thanks to them that the faculty not only maintains a high level of teaching, but also remains the center of modern science in philology, social communications, political science, etc.

So, what are they, the modern mission and main tasks of the IFSK?

– Life convincingly shows that in addition to the knowledge and skills necessary to perform professional tasks, the level of general education and erudition, human individuality and uniqueness are important. Helping student youth to form free, democratic, highly moral citizens; to teach them to think and see opportunities where others see only problems are among the most important missions of the IFSK faculty.