The Illinois Scholars at Risk Program hosts scholars at risk from any country around the world (citizens or permanent residents of the United States are ineligible to apply for the ISAR Program). Illinois Scholars at Risk need not be refugee scholars. Illinois Scholars at Risk can be scholars, researchers, practitioners, activists, writers, and artists at all stages of their careers who are facing severe threats to their lives, freedoms, and well-being due to their identity, work, activism, or for some other reason. They may not be able to continue their scholarly or artistic pursuits within their own countries due to political turmoil or natural disasters. Illinois Scholars at Risk hold advanced terminal degrees (e.g. Ph.D., MD, JD, etc.) and meet the appropriate academic standards in their respective fields.

Scholars at risk do NOT apply directly to the Illinois Scholars at Risk Program. Only permanent faculty members and campus units willing to host at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign can nominate and select a scholar at risk for the Illinois Scholars at Risk Program. That said, scholars at risk who are interested in the Illinois Scholars at Risk Program can complete and submit the Nomination/Expression of Interest Form. All Illinois Scholars at Risk are typically affiliated with the Scholars at Risk (SAR) or the Institute of International Education’s Scholar Rescue Fund (IIE-SRF). Therefore, scholars at risk seeking placement through the ISAR Program are strongly encouraged to contact the Scholars at Risk Network and apply for the Institute of International Education’s Scholar Rescue Fund to maximize their opportunities for successful placement. 

Review and Vetting Process

SAR and IIE-SRF each conduct a thorough review and vetting process of scholars seeking support to confirm their eligibility, verify their qualifications, and assess their need for support. 

SAR Review and Vetting Process: SAR’s review process is premised on verifying an individual’s scholarship, risk, and overall fit for the SAR network and the services they provide. A brief outline of how they review these areas is below. 

Scholarship: When an individual applies to SAR for assistance, the SAR staff consider the degree candidates hold, their level of teaching and research experience, and the number and quality of their publications or other written work. SAR does not require a Ph.D., but the majority of the scholars they work with do hold advanced degrees. Where they have questions on degrees or a university that a candidate has attended (i.e., understanding a university’s legal or accreditation status), they have trusted credential evaluation partners they contact for confirmation.
References: For every case, SAR staff require academic references to support their understanding of a candidate’s scholarly caliber and prior academic work; these reference letters come from the references themselves to SAR and are a mandatory part of the review process. 
Academic work samples: SAR staff request academic work samples, and increasingly, they look at which journals candidates have published in and whether these are indexed/peer-reviewed journals. If a candidate’s only publications are in non-indexed or less-reputable journals, they may request additional work samples. For junior scholars or human rights defenders with few or no publications, they ask for a research proposal or other writing to help them understand their ability to contribute to an academic environment. They check research proposals for obvious plagiarism.
Determination of qualifying risk: SAR’s determination of qualifying risk is based on SAR’s best efforts given available resources and information and draws on SAR staff’s experience with thousands of at-risk individuals worldwide. A candidate is considered to be “at-risk” if they are suffering a qualifying threat or are still suffering the disadvantages of a threat in the past. A qualifying threat can generally be understood as an infringement of a recognized human right by a third party outside of their control. In making a determination, SAR staff review materials provided by candidates for assistance including:
Risk statement: Every candidate is asked to provide a first-person written account of the risk they have faced, which is called a risk statement. These are usually 1-3 pages in length and are included in the SAR member packets provided during the candidate selection process.
Corroboration: SAR staff ask for corroboration of the incidents that candidates allege in their risk statement – depending on the type of risk the individual is reporting, this could include media articles about the individual/incident, police reports, court documents, letters of dismissal, etc. SAR staff also research the reported risk on their own, seeking additional corroboration, cross-checking reports with their records of previous cases from the same country to determine whether the reported risk falls in line with general risk trends they are seeing from that country whether from their casework or the Academic Freedom Monitoring Project. 
References/external review: In cases where there is less corroboration available, SAR staff will reach out to outside experts familiar with the region to verify whether the reported risk is in line with their understanding of the country context and similar risks other individuals of that profile have faced. In other situations, they may ask candidates to provide a risk reference (a lawyer familiar with their case, a local NGO, etc.) who can help them understand the reported risk. If they cannot verify an individual’s risk status, they will not accept their case for assistance. 

IIE-SRF Review and Vetting Process: IIE-SRF staff conduct a thorough vetting of their fellows during the application process. For IIE-SRF Fellows whose fellowships are funded through private grants, the review and vetting is done by IIE-SRF staff as they review their fellows’ applications, conduct a  thorough internet search of a scholar’s name, academic activities, past and current academic institution affiliation, review several references, including two academic references and two threat references, follow up with clarification questions to specific references, and if applicable, further outreach to IIE-SRF partners and contacts to verify a scholar’s [reported] threat. IIE-SRF Fellows whose fellowships are funded by a public grant through the United States government (USG) undergo an additional layer of vetting, where IIE-SRF staff collect specific information from them, and share it with their partners at State to vet through their internal systems to confirm their eligibility and need for a fellowship.

If you have any questions about scholar eligibility, please contact isarillinois@illinois.edu.