Interview with Viktoriia Verteba, psychologist of the mobile brigade of social and psychological assistance

The Department of Psychology of Zaporizhzhia Polytechnic National University has existed at the university since 2007 and over the years has produced many generations of graduates, most of whom work in their profession or actively use the competencies acquired during their studies in their professional activities and life. Many of our graduates accepted the challenges of the war and are currently working with crisis categories of the population, providing support to victims of the war in Ukraine, in particular, in Zaporizhzhia.

Viktoria Verteba is a graduate of the Department of Psychology (in 2015 she completed her bachelor’s degree with honors, and in 2016 she completed her master’s degree). Viktoriia worked for a long time as a child psychologist in one of the Zaporizhzhia schools, in particular, she was involved as a psychologist in research and experimental work at the All-Ukrainian level on the topic «Ensuring the mental health of a child by means of Waldorf pedagogy» (the scientific leader of the experiment is Tetyana Borodulkina, an associate professor of the Department of Psychology of NU «Zaporizhzhia Polytechnic»). Since 2014, she has been actively engaged in volunteer activities, in particular, she worked as a volunteer psychologist in the project «Summer Camp 2014» / «Vacation in Ukrainian», which was conducted by the Canadian-Ukrainian Foundation and the International Fund «New Generation» for 310 children – orphans, children deprived of parental care, children from low-income families, children of immigrants from the East regions of the country and Crimea and the children of military personnel who participated in the anti-terrorist operation — in the village of Vorokhta, Ivano-Frankivsk region; and also already in Zaporizhzhia, she was one of the psychologists-volunteers of the Psychological Crisis Service and, together with her colleagues, conducted classes on psychological recovery for migrant children.

The full-scale invasion affected the further professional activities of Viktoriia – since February 2023, she has been working as a psychologist of a mobile social and psychological assistance team (BO «BF »Posmishka YA” with the support of UNFPA) and provides emergency and planned psychological assistance to victims of domestic violence, and also participates in the provision of first psychological assistance to victims of rocket attacks in our city. In July 2023, she started her activities in the same direction at the Zaporizhzhia City Center of Social Services.

It is about her current activities, as well as her professional path, about her studies at our university, in an interview conducted by Mariia Kolomoets, our 2nd-year master’s student (group SNz-113m), conducted with her on October 23. During the interview, Viktoriia talked about her years of study and her first steps in the profession; about your professional experience and current challenges; gave useful recommendations to psychology students of Zaporizhzhia Polytechnic University regarding self-help and professional development.

Thank you to our graduate, psychologist Viktoriia Verteba, for your time! The video recording of the interview can be viewed on the YouTube channel of the Department of Psychology at the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jq8J_KpoKpM