UW - University of Ljubljana Scholars Exchange: Current and Past Participants

Dr. Alaniz visited Ljubljana in December 2019,  collaborating with Professor Darja Zaviršek, Chair of Ljubljana's Social Justice and Inclusion Program within its School of Social Work.  He conducted research on the impact of the publishing house Stripburger, a major contributor to the revival of comics in post-1990 East Central Europe.

Dr. Fabjan visited the UW in October 2019 to collaborate on shared interests with Professors Matthew McQuinn and Thomas Quinn, as well as others in the Department of Astronomy.  They worked together on feedback from Active galactic nuclei and intergalactic medium at low redshift, and explored options for ongoing collaboration in these areas between the UW and Ljubljana.

Veronica visited Ljubljana in September / October 2019 to collaborate with mentors Professor Milena Blažić and leading Slovene ethnologist Professor Monika Kropej.  She worked with them on collecting, studying, and translating Slovene dialect folk tales of the Resia Valley in far northeastern Italy.

Captain Suban visited the UW in May 2019 to collaborate with counterparts Professor William Wilcock in the School of Oceanography, and Professor Nives Dolšak in the School of Marine and Environmental Affairs.

Dr. Tomczuk visited Ljubljana in March 2018 to resume a collaboration previously begun with Professor Damjan Mandelc (UL Sociology), continue her research on Romani and refugee integration in Slovenia, teach classes on statistical research methods, consult with a wide range of colleagues, and conduct interviews for a new research project.

Dr. Marinčič visited the University of Washington in October 2018 to collaborate with Professor James Clauss, consult with other UW Classics faculty and students, deliver a guest colloquium on Ovid, and to conduct research in Suzzallo Library.

Gerrit visited Ljubljana in November / December 2018 to collaborate with Professor Sebastjan Vrhovnik of the Academy of Music, consult with and serve as guest conductor for a number of choral ensembles, and to explore the Slovene choral music tradition as a field within his doctoral program.

Dr. Marinčič visited UW in October 2018 to collaborate with colleagues in the Department of French and Italian, serve as a guest lecturer, and offer a public reading from her award-winning original Slovene prose fiction in English translation, which was followed by a moderated question and answer period.

Dr. Blejec spent four weeks in May / June 2018 at Friday Harbor Labs and UW Seattle in a research visit coordinated by Professor Adam Summers (FHL) and Professor Mikaela Parker (UW E-Science Institute).  He delivered guest seminars on bio-statistical methods and the use of R for analysis of biological data.

Dr. Burgett visited Ljubljana in October 2017 to deliver the plenary address at an international conference on culture and language, plan collaborative efforts on cultural keywords with faculty at the University of Ljubljana, and to speak and consult at the University of Primorska (Koper, Slovenia).

Dr. Klemenčič visited the UW in May / June 2017, with his primary UW counterpart Professor Stuart Lingo (Department of Art History).  He delivered guest lectures on baroque art in Slovenia, particularly the sculptural work of Francesco Robba; explored prospects for collaborative UW-UL summer programs in art history; and conducted research in Suzzallo Library.

Dr. Wang visited Ljubljana in February / March 2017 to collaborate with University of Ljubljana Professor Nataša Vampelj-Suhadolnik (Asian Languages) on involving European partners in her Online Scholarly Translation Collaborative Project focusing on Chinese literature.

Dr. Sattler visited UW in April 2017, collaborating with his counterpart, UW varsity volleyball coach Keegan Cook, with particular emphasis on injury prevention and volleyball-related sports medicine.

Dr. Dobkowski visited Ljubljana and the University of Ljubljana Marine Biology Station in Piran on the Adriatic Coast, to work with Professor Borut Mavrič, teach field methods to groups of UL Masters students, and deliver lectures on Puget Sound intertidal ecology in comparison with Adriatic, and factors favoring bull kelp habitat.

Professor Wong visited Ljubljana in September / October 2016 and worked with Professor Igor Maver from the Department of English.  During the first three weeks he guest-taught a course in American poetry, and delivered a lecture on Asian American poets, 1960s-present.

Dr. Blažić visited UW in October 2016, working with Professor Michael Biggins (Department of Slavic Languages) on a co-edited anthology of Slovene crossover literature.  She also delivered public lectures on recent Slovenian children’s and crossover literature and consulted with UW graduate students on their Slovene-related research.

Sara visited Ljubljana in March / April 2016, working with Professor Damjan Mandelc (Department of Sociology).  She delivered three campus lectures - on issues in U.S. minority rights and current issues of Roma minorities in Czechia and Slovakia in context of the EU – and did research on Roma-majority relations in Slovenia.

Dr. Sodnik visited UW in April / May 2016, working with UW Professor Linda Ng Boyle (Industrial and Systems Engineering).  He conducted research in the Human Factors and Statistical Modeling Lab on speech interfaces for in-vehicle interaction, delivered a seminar on his own research, and collaborated on a joint UL-UW publication for the Automotive UI 2016 international Conference.

Dr. Clauss visited Ljubljana in April 2015, working with Professor Marko Marinčič (Department of Classics) on topics of shared research interest. He spoke to at least six different classes and faculty groups on topics ranging from katabasis in myth and cinema, to honors education in the U.S., delivered a formal lecture, and visited Roman archaeological sites throughout Slovenia and the region.

Dr. Zajc visited UW in March / April 2015, working with Professors David McDonald and Beth Kolko (Department of Human-Centered Design and Engineering).  He observed approaches at UW to teaching and researching multi-media and human-computer interaction to inform a sustainable program at UL.

Dr. Ettl visited Ljubljana in September / October 2015, working with colleagues in the University of Ljubljana Department of Forestry – Professors Thomas Nagel, Jurij Diaci, and Andrej Bončina – to research old-growth and multi-species silvicultural systems.

Dr. Winterbottom visited Ljubljana in October 2015, working with Professors Ana Kučan and Davorin Gazvoda (University of Ljubljana Department of Landscape Architecture) to present on landscaping techniques for recuperative facilities, based on collaborative fieldwork previously underway in Croatia.

Cyrus visited Ljubljana in July-September 2015, working with mentors Professors Tomo Virk (University of Ljubljana Department of Comparative Literature) and Vesna Mikolič (University of Primorska School of Humanities) on ekphrasis and ecocriticism (respectively) in Slovene literature.  He also presented two public lectures on his research topics in those areas. 

Dr. Sanford visited Ljubljana in April 2014, collaborating with UL Professor Grega Strban (Law) on issues of health care law in the U.S. and Slovenia.  She also delivered three lectures to law school and social work classes, gave one presentation to the Association of Labor and Social Security Law, and consulted with colleagues in the UL School of Public Health.

Professor Pak visited UW in October 2014, collaborating with UW Professor Mark Zirpel (School of Art) on shared issues in glass arts teaching and design and technique.  She also participated in studio sessions with students, delivered a public lecture on glass arts in Slovenia and visited Pilchuck Glass School in Stanwood, WA.

Dr. Yetisgen visited Ljubljana in June 2014 to collaborate with UL Professor Dimitar Hristovski (Institute for Biostatistics and Medical Informatics) in a joint project on literature-based discovery in the pharmacogenomics domain, combining UW data with a new analytical tool devised in Ljubljana.  She also delivered a lecture on “Extracting Semantics from Clinical Text” at the Institute.

Dr. Hadži visited UW for the entire month of May 2014, during which she consulted with colleagues and students in Slavic Languages and Literatures, and gave a talk on the standardization of the successor languages to Serbo-Croatian in post-Yugoslav space at the Department of Linguistics May colloquium.

Dr. Breidenthal visited Ljubljana in June 2013, collaborating with UL Professor Tadej Kosel (Aeronautical Engineering) on the problem of vortex generator design in a corner, with application to winglets.  He also visited the headquarters of Pipistrel, Slovenia’s innovative small aircraft designer and manufacturer; attended the International Conference on Alpine Meteorology in Kranjska Gora, Slovenia; visited colleagues at the UL Marine Biostation on the Adriatic Coast; and delivered a guest lecture on turbulent entrainment.

Dr. Hrovatin visited UW in May / June 2013, collaborating with UW Professor Nives Dolšak (Economics and Environment & Marine Affairs) on two topics: public policy incentives for improving home energy efficiency through retrofits, and factors driving Slovenian companies’ investment in energy savings.  Data mining and processing was completed later in the summer, with findings published in the Journal of Cleaner Production (2016) and presented at a conference organized by the International Association of Energy Economics.  She also delivered a lecture on “Willingness to pay for green electricity: the case of Slovenia” at the invitation of the School of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences, UW Bothell.

John visited Ljubljana in April / May 2013, where he worked with UL Professor Svanibor Pettan (Department of Ethnomusicology), delivered three public lectures (on archiving music, popular music in Seattle, and major U.S. music archives), and did preliminary research for a typology of popular music of Ljubljana.

Dr. Dolšak visited Ljubljana in February 2012 to collaborate with her colleagues in the UL School of Economics and Business on public incentives favoring environmentally sound economic investments.  Having received her undergraduate degree from the University of Ljubljana (Ph.D., Indiana), she was able to lecture to students and faculty in Slovene and laid groundwork for joint research.

Dr. Štrus visited UW, primarily Friday Harbor Labs, in May / June 2012.  She worked with biologists in the FHL Center for Cell Dynamics on issues of cuticle renewal in crustaceans of the species Ligia palasii, which is widely distributed in Pacific Northwest marine environments.  She also lectured on topics in invertebrate biology and developed contacts in pursuit of ongoing faculty and student exchanges with UL.

Dr. Haerling visited Ljubljana in March / April 2012, collaborating with several colleagues in the UL School of Nursing, delivering four lectures (on HIV prevention in Botswana, U.S. health care systems, and other topics), and observing clinical nursing skills labs.  She also explored topics of mutual interest for ongoing UW-UL collaboration in nursing.

Dr. Gold visited Ljubljana in September / October 2011, collaborating with Professor Aleš Galič (UL School of Law) on issues of mediation and alternative dispute resolution in the U.S. and Slovenia.  Since mediation is relatively new in Slovenian law and not yet part of law schools’ curriculum, Professor Gold served as an expert advisor on curricular development, and met with judges in Slovenia who have recently begun working with court-annexed mediation programs recently developed with significant input from U.S. legal experts.

Dr. Kosel visited UW in May / June 2011, working with Professor Robert Breidenthal and Dr. Christopher Lum, both in the UW Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics.  He participated in research on quantitative risk assessment of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs, or drones) in populated areas.  Together with UW’s Christopher Lum and others, Dr. Kosel co-authored a paper on Assessing and Estimated Risk of Operating Unmanned Aerial Systems in Populated Areas, published as part of the 11^th AIAA Aviation Technology, Integration and Operations Conference in Virginia Beach, VA.