Professor Kai A. Schafft: “UJEP is a dynamic intellectual environment. Ústí made a big impression on me.”
During his spring visit to Jan Evangelista Purkyně University in Ústí nad Labem, Professor Kai A. Schafft from Penn State University gave an interview to the university magazine Silverius. This followed on from his May visit to UJEP as part of the J. E. Purkyně Visiting Scholar Programme, during which he lectured, was an active member of a working group across three faculties, and collaborated intensively with the team of Dr. Silvie Rita Kučerová from the Department of Geography at the Faculty of Science, UJEP.
The interview, conducted by Silvie Rita Kučerová, captures Schafft’s observations from his first and current visits to our region. “Today, Czechia seems cleaner, brighter, and less oppressive to me,” he says in one of his answers. He was particularly impressed by the Ústí nad Labem Region itself, which he describes as “much more economically diversified and less isolated” compared to other coal regions he has been studying in Europe and the US for a long time.
Professor Schafft has long been interested in social and spatial inequalities and the transformation of coal regions. During his visit, he got to know the Ústí region from a personal perspective – he ran up Střížovický vrch hill, visited Most, and was pleasantly surprised by the diversity of the landscape. “Overall, I was impressed by how beautiful it is here – from the cities to the small towns to the countryside,” he sums up his impressions.
In the interview, he also discusses the beginnings of a new collaboration with academics from UJEP: “I sincerely hope that this is the beginning of a new and close collaboration that we can look forward to.” It is already certain that this collaboration will continue within the OP JAK Periferie project, in which Professor Schafft has been participating as a member of the research team since January 1, 2026.
You can read the entire interview in the current issue of the university magazine Silverius.
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