In its devotion to improve economics education across Eastern Europe and Central Asia, the CERGE-EI Foundation runs an ambitious program to bring economic scholars into undergraduate classrooms across the region. Bring best practices and modern economic knowledge, these scholars help fight against the dismal education standards and outdated resources that propagate ignorance and misinformation in this crucial region.

Known as the CERGE-EI Teaching Fellows, this program supports both short-term and long-term teaching posts. Every year it provides longer-term ‘career integration fellowships’ for economists who obtained their PhD in the West and plan to assume full-time academic positions teaching undergraduate economics in any country in Central and Eastern Europe or the countries of the former Soviet Union.

The purpose of the fellowship is to make academic careers in the post-communist countries more attractive for such graduates by providing supplemental income that should bridge the gap between academic and private sector salaries.

The fellowship also provides a set of services designed to improve the academic environment for the fellow including remote access to CERGE-EI Library resources and the opportunity to organize research stays at CERGE-EI.

Below is a list of the 2014-2017 career integration fellows:

Vardan Baghdasharian (PhD Catholic University of Milan, Italy, 2014) –  American University of Armenia, Yerevan, Armenia

Anna Bogomolova (PhD CERGE-EI, 2014)  – Novosibirsk State University, Russia

Lukáš Lafférs (PhD Norwegian School of Economics, 2014) – Matej Bel University, Banská Bystrica, Slovakia

Hyrije Abazi-Alili (PhD Staffordshire University, 2013) – South East European University, Tetovo, Macedonia

Petra Baji (PhD University of Maastricht, 2013) – Corvinus University of Budapest, Hungary

Ismail Baydur (PhD University of Virginia, 2014) – ADA University (formerly Azerbaijan Diplomatic Academy), Baku, Azerbaijan

Paola Bertoli (PhD European Doctorate [Universities of Bologna, Hamburg and Erasmus-Rotterdam], 2010) – Prague Economics University (VŠE), Prague, Czech Republic

Daniel Horn (PhD Central European University, 2010) – Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary

Pavla (Nikolovová) Vozárová (PhD CERGE-EI, 2014) – Czech Technical University (ČVUT) in Prague, Czech Republic

Mira Nurmakhanova (PhD Iowa State University, 2008) – KIMEP, Almaty, Kazakhstan

Yessengali Oskenbayev (PhD ZEF Bonn, expected 2014) – Suleyman Demirel University, Almaty, Kazakhstan

Esmeralda Shehaj (PhD Shaffordshire University, 2013) – University of Tirana, Albania

Petar Stankov (PhD CERGE-EI, 2014) – University of National and World Economy, Sofia, Bulgaria

Aleksandar Vasilev (PhD University of Glasgow, 2013) – American University in Bulgaria, Blagoevgrad, Bulgaria

Dmitriy Vorobyev (PhD CERGE-EI, 2013) – Graduate School of Economics and Management, Ural Federal University, Ekaterinburg, Russia

The new full-time fellows are teaching in 10 countries across the region (Russia, Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, Albania, Czech Republic, Azerbaijan, Hungary, Macedonia, Slovakia, and Armenia)