- Viktoria Podvoiska is a Ukrainian evacuee who moved to Poland at the beginning of the full-scale invasion of her country.
- Viktoria completed the UNITAR 2023 “Bolstering Livelihoods: Digital Reskilling for Ukrainian Women Evacuees in Poland” programme, where she chose the geographic information system (GIS) sub-track.
- She looks forward to when she can return to Kyiv and use her skills towards rebuilding Ukraine.
- The Bolstering Livelihoods programme was funded by the Government and People of Japan. The GIS sub-track was organized in partnership with a Japanese start-up company.
UNITAR
14 November 2024, Hiroshima, Japan - On early morning of 24 February 2022, Viktoria Podvoiska saw the very first bombs falling on Kyiv. She immediately gathered all her family and said, “War has started. We must leave”.
They first evacuated to the countryside but quickly realized that the hostilities were even more acute there. After two weeks of uncertainty, Viktoria agreed to leave with her younger son on a volunteer mission, driving other mothers with young children to help them safely reach Poland. Her husband and older son stayed behind.
As the conflict worsened, Viktoria’s husband told her not to come back. Her life in Poland began, and Viktoria started looking for housing, a new job and ways to survive in the new country.
UNITAR
“I was looking for inspiration”, says Viktoria, when she found out about the UNITAR programme “Bolstering Livelihoods: Digital Reskilling for Ukrainian Women Evacuees in Poland”. The programme was launched in October 2023 to train approximately 500 Ukrainian women evacuees in Poland in high-demand digital skills, with the ultimate goal of improving their livelihood potential.
Viktoria has a technical education and some previous experience in the field and was impressed by the variety of courses offered. The programme participants had the option to choose from one of four tracks: data analytics, cybersecurity, geographic information systems (GIS) and digital graphics and web design. Viktoria decided to apply for the GIS sub-track, which was organized in partnership with the Japanese start-up company Eukarya.
Viktoria was surprised by the breadth and depth of the programme. She could not imagine how, within such a short period of time, it was possible to teach people with little knowledge about the field and those who are just at the beginning of their path.
“The course turned out to be very in-depth and convinced me that with motivation and at will, it was possible to learn anything. Even though I was not a beginner, I discovered new products and upgraded existing knowledge, and saw how the industry is developing.” - Viktoria Podvoiska, UNITAR training programme alumna (Ukraine)
After completing self-paced online training, over 40 outstanding participants were selected to participate in the final forum in Warsaw. The forum provided the opportunity for participants to showcase their skills and meet potential employers. Viktoria was among those selected for the forum and presented her final project, “Impact of geographic factors on the population resettlement network”.
Viktoria says that through the UNITAR programme, she was able to deepen her knowledge about ways to obtain new data, process it and present the results on maps using the QGIS software. While continuing to live and work in Poland, Viktoria keeps her hope of returning to Kyiv so she may apply the knowledge and skills she learned to rebuild her country.
More information about the programme
The Bolstering Livelihoods programme was funded by the Government and People of Japan. It was a successful collaborative endeavour with institutions and companies in Ukraine (Kyiv Mohyla Academy, Ukraine Catholic University), Poland (Polish Japanese Academy of Information Technology), and Japan (Japanese start-up company Eukarya), and many other organizations and individuals who have dedicated time and passion to the programme.
About UNITAR
The United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) is a dedicated training arm of the United Nations. In 2023, UNITAR trained over 540,000 learners around the world to support their actions for a better future. UNITAR has a global presence, with offices in Geneva, Hiroshima, New York and Bonn, as well as networks around the world. Find out more at https://www.unitar.org/