In the News

A world-class, high-tech researcher, Ahmad Adib Sha’ar made his way from Aleppo, Syria, to the United States with his wife and children after the Syrian civil war erupted. He was assisted by the Institute of International Education Scholar Rescue Fund, which supports visiting scholars from war-torn areas. Thanks to the generosity of donors, Sha’ar will be able to continue his beneficial research while serving as a visiting professor at Harvey Mudd College.

Turkey is now the number one country for applications from under-threat scholars seeking safety in Western universities, according to two charities that help at-risk academics.

With hundreds of academics sacked, suspended or under investigation in the wake of the unsuccessful coup attempt in July, the Scholar Rescue Fund has faced an “unprecedented” number of requests for help, its director Sarah Willcox told an audience at the European Association for International Education’s annual conference, held in Liverpool from 13 to 16 September.

Back in 2012, when protests had turned to revolution, engineering lecturer and researcher Tarek Kasmieh began to look for a way out of Syria. He says he wasn’t political and, unlike many other academics, he made a point of not taking sides in the conflict in order to avoid being targeted. But he still remembers mortars falling around the Syrian Virtual University and the Higher Institute for Applied Sciences and Technology in Damascus where he worked.

In his new life outside of Syria, Kasmieh believes he has found a way to put his skills to use, as he is trying to improve the lives of wheelchair users. He works as a researcher at the Laboratory of Industrial and Human Automation Control, Mechanical Engineering and Computer Science at the Université de Valenciennes in northern France. Here he has helped found a start-up company called AutoNomad Mobility to create and market a product that adapts regular wheelchairs into motorized ones. “With no major innovation since its invention over a century ago, the average wheelchair is overdue a redesign,” says Kasmieh.

Al-Fanar Media profiles IIE-SRF alumna Amal Alachkar of Syria and her work studying the effects of war and stress on fetuses and new born babies. It's work that could have implications for millions of Syrian children for many years to come. 

A special auction by Christie’s is raising funds for artists and academics living in areas of conflict, including Syria and Iraq. Anna Wallace-Thompson speaks to one of the artists whose work is included in the sale, and who has benefited from the actions of The Scholar Rescue Fund. 

A crackdown on Turkey’s higher education sector after a failed coup has far-reaching effects for fraying academic collaboration and exchange.