Refugee Girls: Film screening and discussion in Vilnius 

The Arqus Alliance and the Scholar at Risk Network organise a screening of the film, “Refugee Girls”, on 23 September at 16:30 (UTC+3) in the Small Hall of the Pasaka Cinema Theatre (Šv. Ignoto g. 4/3) in Vilnius.

This documentary follows the lives of three young refugee women in Europe, telling the story of Robin, an Afghan student at Rome’s La Sapienza University, as she and other refugees navigate university life and adjust to their new reality in Italy, while also portraying Sofia and Bozhena, two Ukrainian students pursuing their studies at the University of Barcelona and continuing their distance learning in Ukraine, showing how, despite the difficult challenges of forced migration, these young women face the future with hope.

The film screening will be attended remotely by the director, Leonardo Cinieri Lombroso, and the project manager and human rights researcher, Elisa Gamba, who will analyse the inclusion of refugees in university communities. The event will be divided into three parts: a brief introduction to the topic, the screening of the film and a discussion presenting a range of initiatives to support refugee students.

The University of Padova is implementing this initiative together with Arqus Universities, Arqus Parterns and associate Universities: the University of Graz, Leipzig University, Maynooth University, Vilnius University, the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy and members of the “Scholars at Risk” network.

This event is part of the bottom-up initiative “Arqus: an Alliance supporting refugees’ right to a qualified and unique study experience”, which aims to organise a day of reflection on refugee students at each partner university. 

“Arqus: an Alliance supporting refugees’ right to a qualified and unique study experience” is one of the many ad hoc bottom-up initiatives financed by the Arqus Innovation Fund.