College Year in Athens celebrates 60 years
CYA’s founder was among the Greek refugees forced to flee Asia Minor a century ago
Remembering the centenary of the Asia Minor Campaign, let us not only look at what we lost, but what the refugees offered to Greece. Each in their own way. Like the industrious Smyrniot Ismini Phylactopoulou, who crossed to Chios in a small boat to escape the flames engulfing her hometown at the age of 15 and found herself studying in the United States having earned a scholarship set up by Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos for refugees. It was then that the young woman understood that Greece would benefit many times over if it could attract foreign students that would fall in love with its history and culture by completing part of their studies in Greece. This led to the creation of the College Year in Athens program in 1962.
The primary reason the CYA program is proud is that it molds its participants into world citizens, with an understanding and appreciation of other cultures
The evidence speaks for itself. To this day, the program has approximately 11,000 graduates, of whom about 300 are now academics on Greek issues in American educational institutions. Every year it brings to Greece about 1,000 new students. It has its own faculty and academic buildings near the Kallimarmaro Stadium in central Athens.
However, the primary reason the College Year in Athens program has to be proud is that it molds its participants into world citizens, with an understanding and appreciation of other cultures.
This year, the program marks 60 years of operations and this occasion was celebrated a few weeks ago with a beautiful reception in a cool Kifissia garden with staff members, graduates and partners in attendance. Along with many other leading political and academic figures invited to the special event was Education Minister Niki Kerameus, who in her brief address to those in attendance thanked the president of CYA, Alexis Phylactopoulos, for his tireless efforts to set up a successful model of cooperation with American universities, which has been tremendously valuable in the recent collaborations between Greece’s public universities and leading American educational institutions. Phylactopoulos, who inherited his outstanding mother’s virtues, highlighted that the program was “a startup in 1962 without funds, the product of the restless mind of an independent woman who was not afraid of failure and who wanted to explore her vision.” Phylactopoulos, when picking up the torch, was successful in developing the institution to ensure it remains in a position where it can adjust to today’s complex requirements.
Also present for the event was the new United States ambassador to Greece, George Tsunis, who in his address highlighted that CYA has developed thousands of friends of Greece across the world. The addresses concluded with Endy Zemenides, a CYA graduate and current executive director of the Hellenic American Leadership Council (HALC), who stressed the need for more American university students with Greek heritage to study in Greece and spoke on the activation of the organizations of Greek communities abroad.
