Tallinn University is proud to have an international and highly competent academic staff. Below we will introduce one lecturer who arrived here less than two years ago, but has already started many projects, including a start-up in one of Estonia’s start-up hubs, Garage48.

Hello, Zsolt! Please describe yourself briefly - how did you come to study and teach social work? What is your background and how did you find Tallinn University?

My name is Zsolt Bugarszki and I am Hungarian, but I currently live in Tallinn and I lecture Social Policy at Tallinn University. Before, I used to teach social work in Budapest at the Faculty of Social Sciences of ELTE University. I am a social worker but I received my MA and PhD in social policy. Over the last 20 years, I have been working in the field of mental health and disability care. I usually deal with recovery oriented community-based services trying to promote reform in Eastern-European and post-Soviet countries. I have been working in several countries in this area, mostly in the new member states of the EU, but also in the Caucasus and Central Asia.I visited Estonia several times before and I always had the impression that this country is outstanding in the Eastern-European post-Soviet region. I wanted to know what the magic was. How come so many of our countries are still struggling with corruption and with a strong post-communist character but Estonia has made a relevant progress? I was so eager to come here to see with my own eyes what makes Estonia so different, that I applied for a guest-lecturer position at Tallinn University. That’s how I came to be here in 2013 September. Later, there was an opportunity to apply for a regular position and I decided to try, as I was very impressed by the fast changing atmosphere of Estonia. So now I am a regular lecturer here with a 5 year contract.

How long have you been at Tallinn University? How does it compare to other places you have worked? How has the adaption process been and are there some things impossible to get used to?

I arrived 1,5 years ago and I had a very smooth reception. I received a lot of help. Moving to another country is always troublesome. I arrived here with my wife and with our daughter who was 1 year old at that time. Fitting your life into a few pieces of luggage is not easy, so it helped a lot that we received proper rent opportunity from the University and also support from the DORA program to settle down. I appreciated a lot of the introductory courses at TLU that were organized for guest lecturers and during the first semester, a mentor helped my work here. I also had the opportunity to participate in an Estonian course at TLU. I can say that the adaptation process was very amazing. My colleagues helped me a lot.It is impressive that Estonian students have excellent language skills. It’s not a problem at all to teach in English here, and the University has a growing international atmosphere. Maybe there is still space for progress to integrate more international students, as at times I have a feeling that the Estonian students and foreign students are sort of isolated from each other. But in this third semester of mine, I’ve already seen some positive changes.Basically, Tallinn University is facing the same challenges as a majority of Eastern-European Universities that I have seen before. At times, I still feel that kind of old school atmosphere where students are only pupils and traditional classroom lectures or seminars are the major educational methods. We have very few connections to the outside world. The University is a rather isolated academic island instead of being a well-connected creative hub that addresses the existing problems and challenges of Estonia. The good news that maintains my enthusiasm and that made me to apply for a longer term is that it seems that it will be changing very soon.

How do You see the Tallinn University structural reform process from your standpoint? Would it help or hinder your work? What are your biggest fears or concerns regarding the change? What are your expectations?

I am very glad that relevant changes have started at Tallinn University. When I first heard about the reforms, I was concerned that it was all about budget cuts and that our clear social worker identity was disappearing due to the structural changes.I participated in several events and I read the concepts. The most convincing was the presentation about the problem-based learning method of the Danish Roskilde University. This innovative and creative approach to interdisciplinary teaching and research is exactly the way I like to work and I would be very happy to work in a setting like this. And as I understand now, this is exactly the direction Tallinn University will take.

My expectation is to turn the University into a creative hub where students and lecturers are working together to solve relevant problems and learning is occurring not primarily by traditional lectures but rather by project based development work. Being connected to companies, governmental organizations and to the local communities is essential for a University. 

You are known for doing some interdisciplinary work at Tallinn University, could you describe these projects briefly? Do you expect these to blossom or wither along with the structural reform?

Yes, I run several experimental projects at TLU and I am really very glad that I have not only had the freedom to run these projects but I have received a lot of support for them. Last year, with my colleagues Koidu Saia and Karmen Toros, we established a working group at the Social Work Institute in order to initiate projects to contribute to the development of Estonian social work.About 25-30 students joined this initiative called “Meie SILD” and with a core group we started to participate in two very exciting innovative projects in the field of disability care and mental health. One project is in co-operation with the service provider AS Hoolekandeteenused where we will establish the first Café/Restaurant in Estonia that is run by disabled people.I am very interested in the vibrant IT field of Estonia and I started to participate in the events of Garage48 in order to build links between my University work and this extremely creative start-up scene of Estonia. In 2014 November, I joined their “Enable” hackathon in Tallinn where they encouraged developers, marketers and designers to co-operate with disabled people and with social workers in order to develop smart solutions to increase disabled people’s quality of life. As a result, we established “Helpific”, a person to person platform on the internet that connects disabled people with volunteers that are ready to help them.

We have a very professional and enthusiastic multidisciplinary team on both projects and starting from January 2015 with the leadership of our BA Social Work student Triin Olgo, 15 TLU students can participate in the development work.I also try to connect these development activities with my courses. In co-operation with the Finnish Laurea University, we run a course for eServices using the online e-learning feature of Laurea for it. This is an experimental course combining social work with ICT and business development methods. We would like to create a course from this where students from many different fields can create multidisciplinary teams and their ideas can be realized with the help of companies and business partners. This way of teaching is very strong in Denmark, Sweden and Finland, and I try to do it in a similar way at TLU.We work with similar methods in co-operation with ELTE University in Budapest. Last semester we created a parallel course about community development for TLU and ELTE students connecting the classrooms on the internet. There are still a lot of challenges with the technology we use, but I find these types of international connections very promising.I hope that these initiatives will be also encouraged in the new structure of TLU and I will have the opportunity to work with lecturers and students from other institutes, too. I am especially eager to find connections to the communication, media, IT and business development fields as I believe that these creative areas can influence the progress of Estonian social work very positively. 

How do you see the social work landscape in Estonia? If and how could Tallinn University and yourself help develop the system to a better level?

The social work landscape in Estonia is also changing. Just like in any other Eastern-European or post-Soviet countries, this profession has a heritage which is a heavy burden. The culture of large institutions, a slightly punitive attitude of welfare services, and bureaucratic structures are shaping the system instead of very person-centred, tailored creative solutions.

As Estonia is changing very rapidly, the welfare system is also changing and the influence of creative fields, like ICT and media or modern business development approaches may accelerate these changes. Hopefully, in the new structure of TLU and within the framework of problem-based learning, more natural encounters can occur between different fields and I would be glad to contribute with my expertise to different developments in this new structure.

Photo by Heiko Kruusi/Linnaleht.