The Summer School offers a unique opportunity for students and women leaders in social work education in Southeast Europe to enhance knowledge and exchange ideas and lessons learned on gender and leadership within the larger frame of international social work, yet with authentic experiences and situated knowledge of educators from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Kosovo, North Macedonia, and Slovenia gathered around the Southeast Europe Academic Women’s Leadership Network established in June 2013. Aiming at the continuous development of social work education in Southeast Europe, the Summer School builds on an educational vision that blends local, international, and global perspectives and approaches that take gender into account to inform strategies for social development and transformative leadership. 

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To sustain the engagement of social work educators and practitioners on the most pressing issues societies in Southeast Europe are facing, and globally induced by the Covid-19 pandemic, the rise of right-wing ideologies, and environmental crises, we seek to enhance the linkages between academia and practice as particularly important. The summer school is an endeavour that fosters leadership through social work theories, research paradigms, and practices to inform policies and activism on gender and social justice locally and globally. This is a long-term endeavor and not a one-time project, but a school that continues evolving, developing, and “traveling” in time and space across Southeast Europe fostering collaborations and partnerships with social work schools, social work practitioners, students, communities, and institutions.  

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The first summer school took place in Prishtina, hosted by the University of Prishtina, in 2022. The school traveled from Prishtina to Sarajevo in 2023, hosted by the University of Sarajevo. Embodying its nomadic existence, the 2024 summer school will take place in Sofia, Bulgaria.