Helping scholars from troubled places around the world — particularly Afghans before the Taliban takeover and Ukrainians during the current war — has been “challenging, but certainly the most rewarding work I have ever done,” says Jennifer Brick Murtazashvili, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs faculty member and one of this year’s Chancellor’s Distinguished Awardees for public service. “It sort of took over my life for four years.”
Murtazashvili, who is also a nonresident scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, earned the Pitt honor for “making Pitt a place of refuge for at-risk scholars from Ukraine, Iran, Afghanistan and other countries.” This effort has included raising $2 million in their support, hosting a dozen of the scholars, and assembling and organizing student volunteers to provide emergency asylum assistance to 6,000 Afghan citizens. Much of the work has been done through the Center for Governance and Markets, where she is the founding director.
Marty Levine