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Liana Shvachiy's Alumni Story: Found Family and Hidden Potential

Liana was just ten when she had to move from Ukraine to the complete opposite end of the European continent, in Portugal.

As she “snowballed” her way through an EIT education that started in warm Évora and slalomed through the Alpine countries of Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, Liana came to realise she didn’t want graduation to be the end of her time with the EIT Community.

Not only did she keep going back for more advanced degrees in medical science, she’s happily the regional coordinator for Germany, Austria, and Switzerland’s (the DACH Region) EIT Health Innovators Community.

I truly believe that the community has great value. The EIT supports not just students, but also big companies and start-ups as it brings a lot of learning and skills and in some cases funding.

-- Liana Shvachiy

In Liana’s eyes, the EIT was giving her knowledge that no typical medical science programme was giving: skills in entrepreneurship and innovation. In her view, these are logical skills to have – they bridge the gap between scientific ideas, creation, development, and knowledge transmission.

But the EIT programmes were also giving her something much more precious: self-confidence in her own voice and leadership. As she looks back on how her life changed in just two years with the EIT, she realised that the challenges she faced helped develop her ability to communicate with, connect to, and manage people.

Today, you can find Liana on the EIT Health Innovators Community Board and representing this community at the EIT Alumni Board as well. She looks forward to meeting new members of the EIT family and is ready to help give them the same opportunities she was able to have on her own journey.

Learn more about  EIT Health Innovators Community

Find Liana on LinkedIn

About Alumni Stories

Our bi-weekly EIT Alumni stories spotlight the incredible journeys and achievements of our learners. We’ll let them show you what’s possible through the EIT Alumni Community.