Activism is the social engagement of young people who are gathered around a common idea and who, by networking and implementing certain projects, aim to improve the quality of life, acquire competencies and solve current issues, contributing to society in local communities and at the national level. The story below shows that our scholarship holders, despite all of their other obligations, express their activism in different fields.

The Hastor Foundation scholarship holder Aida Kauković, in addition to exceptional success at the Faculty of Criminalistics, Criminology and Security Studies, finds time to contribute to society, both at the local and national level, which is encompassed by the definition of activism. Namely, in her free time, Aida is involved in making documentaries, interactive exhibitions, educational lectures and international projects.

Although she is a criminology student, Aida shows her artistic expression in directing and has directed three documentaries. Two of them were presented at the Sarajevo Film Festival in the previous two years in the program of short documentaries. Encouraged by sports as a positive example for raising children, creating a team and competitive spirit, broadening horizons and meeting new people, Aida and her colleagues decided to explore the so-called negative side of sport in the film “Hate speech on sports fields in B&H”, as opposed to the previously mentioned positive segments of it. The negative side of sport refers to hate speech in the stands and fields. The second festival film “Ali” is a story about a boy who begins his journey from Aleppo as a ten-year-old. Ten years later, in the present day, he is still searching for his home.

The combination of social activism and cinematography is reflected in the film “On the Other Side of the Medal”. The intention of the film is to raise the awareness of the people of Bosnia and Herzegovina about the needs and desires of distressed parents, as well as to pay homage to children who have died of cancer. The creation of this film was initiated by one of the mothers whose child died of cancer and our Aida, with the support of the association “Heart for Children with Cancer”.

The film is currently in the process of applying to numerous festivals, and in 2021 it should also be shown publicly.

Another form of visual art through which Aida emphasizes raising society’s awareness of a particular unpopular topic is an interactive photo exhibition. Together with two other colleagues, she launched a series of exhibitions of photographs of Bosnian refugees during the 1990s and photographs of today’s refugees residing in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The exhibition is dedicated to raising awareness and empathy among the citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina about the suffering of immigrant children and adolescents who have fled their countries in search of security and a better life. Imagine that each of us can tell a new story, more beautiful, brighter, fluttering and with a happy beginning for at least one human being whose photo he sees on a wall for the first time. In addition to that, all the stories of the foreigners from the photos are connected by the same aspiration, the same hope, the same desire – to find a new home on their refugee journey.

In addition to the artistic form of raising awareness of certain problems, Aida also educates young people on how to raise awareness of the possibilities and the right to select information through video activism. Aida tried to point out the importance of film as a means of expressing her own opinion about social events and the fact that film gives a vivid picture that encourages thinking through the transmission of a certain message.

Her participation in the project of the American Embassy in Bosnia and Herzegovina called “Our B&H is in our hands” speaks of the fact that she never forgets to express her love for her homeland. Aida and five other colleagues toured many cities of our country for seven days, filming beautiful landscapes and interviewing young people from those cities, and then turned the footage into short documentaries about tourism promotion, self-made jobs and non-formal education. For participating in this project, Aida also won an award for the “#myHometown” competition.

The Foundation gave me the opportunity I had been waiting for a long time. It invited me on its journey to help other young people on their journey. It is very important to allow young people the opportunity to talk about important issues of our time, to realize their purpose in life and to always have someone’s support as I received the Foundation’s.

We wish our Aida many more successful projects and continuous perseverance in social activism.

Prepared by: Alek Isaković