Congratulations to Dr. Pastushenkov and Dr. Zalaltdinova on being awarded a Curricular Innovation Award from the Mindich Program in Engaged Scholarship!

We are delighted to announce that the Mindich Program in Engaged Scholarship has awarded a Curricular Innovation Award to Dr. Dmitrii Pastushenkov and Dr. Liya Zalaltdinova, Preceptors in the Russian Language Program at Harvard University. This award will support the redesign of Advanced Russian 103 as an Engaged Scholarship course, with a particular focus on project-based learning and student work designed for audiences beyond the classroom. The course will be offered beginning in Spring 2027 and will count toward the course requirement for the Certificate for Civic Engagement.

The award will support the redesign of the course and the creation of a companion workbook and other instructional materials. The course builds on the team’s forthcoming textbook, Global Context: Advanced Russian through Games and Projects (Routledge), co-authored by Dr. Liya Zalaltdinova, Dr. Elmira Zhamaletdinova (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München), Dr. Valentina Zhukova (UiT The Arctic University of Norway), and Dr. Dmitrii Pastushenkov.