Examine peacebuilding, post-conflict transformation, and the impact of international intervention on state building, human rights, and transitional justice in the Balkans.
Program Highlights
- Discover Belgrade, Serbia’s cultural, political, and economic center.
- Choose between three tracks: independent field research, internship, or journalism.
- Compare post-war change in three countries.
- Examine the breakup of Yugoslavia, the violent wars of the 1990s, and current challenges and opportunities in post-conflict transformation.
- Contribute to Reporting Balkans, the program’s online magazine.
Please visit the SIT Study Abroad website for details on program courses (including syllabi), educational excursions, and housing.
Independent Study
During the final four weeks of the program, you can choose to use your new language and cultural skills and the academic knowledge you have acquired to complete an Independent Study Project (ISP) on a topic of interest to you.
Sample topics:
- Impact of international intervention on the peace process
- Transitional justice and education for peace after conflict
- Bosnian perceptions of the Ukraine-Russia conflict
- Integration of Serbia and Kosovo in the European Union
- Islam in Bosnia-Herzegovina and/or in Kosovo
- Human rights and LGBTQI activism in Serbia and/or Bosnia-Herzegovina
SIT internships are hands on and reflective. In addition to completing the internship, you will submit a paper processing your learning experience on the job and analyzing an issue important to the organization you worked with, and/or you will design a socially responsible solution to a problem identified by the organization.
Sample internship sites:
- Working with refugees on the Balkans route at Asylum Protection Center
- Building connections between young people across the Balkans at Youth Initiative for Human Rights
- Supporting journalists in the region through the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network
Key Topics of Study
- The “making and breaking” of Yugoslavia
- Peace and conflict studies: theory and practice in the Balkans
- Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Kosovo in the 1990s: international sanctions, the 1999 NATO bombing, the Dayton Agreement
- History, conflict, and post-conflict transformation in Serbia, Bosnia, and Kosovo
- International intervention and state building in the Balkans and independence movements across Europe
- Democratization processes, EU enlargement, media pluralism, and media freedom
Money Matters
Be sure to discuss how study abroad costs are handled at your school with your study abroad advisor.
SIT tuition and room and board fees include the following:
All educational costs, including educational excursions
- All accommodations and meals for the full program duration
- Transportation to and from the airport, and on all educational excursions
- Health and accident insurance
Scholarships:
- SIT awards nearly $1.6 million in scholarships and grants annually.
- All scholarships and grants are need-based.
- Awards generally range from $500 to $5,000.
- The SIT Pell Grant Match provides matching grants to all students receiving Federal Pell Grant funding when it is applied to an SIT Study Abroad semester program.
- Contact the financial aid and/or study abroad office(s) at your college or university to learn if your school’s scholarships and grants and federal and state aid programs can be applied to an SIT Study Abroad program.
Contact SIT Study Abroad
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