Anastasia Savchenko, 27, a Furman University economics major, won Ukraine's national taekwondo championships nine times before fleeing the war-torn country with her family.
Anastasia Savchenko ’27 is a candidate.
His discovery of taekwondo led to a 10-year career and nine Ukrainian national titles by the time he graduated from high school.
Then Russia invaded, and her planned gap year turned into two, plus a move to another continent.
Applying to an American university with her grades in a war-torn country and learning another language was a struggle, but this summer she finished her freshman year and is one of six students doing undergraduate economics studies at Furman University.
Anastasia Savchenko '27.
“She quickly became aware of what Furman had to offer and quickly learned to take advantage of it,” said Associate Dean Jason Jones, an economics professor and mentor of Savchenko’s research group. (She also caught the attention of her classmates: Ella Harrison ’25 wrote a story about her for an assignment in her Broadcast Communications class, which you can watch here.)
Jones said Savchenko's proposal to study the economic impact of sanctions and war, specifically the disruption of Ukraine's wheat exports, intrigued the team reviewing applications. She was the only freshman accepted into the program this year.
Savchenko never expected his life to unfold the way it did: he planned to continue his education after high school, but he planned to start at an average school in an average Ukrainian city, never considering going to college in the United States.
Her gap year was to focus on taekwondo, training six days a week from October to August.
But the war changed plans.
“My parents decided to leave Ukraine while they still could,” she said.
The first few months in Duncan, S.C., were stressful and lonely for the family, until Savchenko’s aunt took them to English Crossing, a ministry of Hope Point Church in Spartanburg that offers English lessons to immigrants. Savchenko was placed in the senior class taught by Amy Barnhart Henderson ’95.
“I knew she was smart, but I didn't know what she was like,” Henderson said.
She wanted to know that.
When Savchenko was ready to start applying to college, she asked Henderson to read her essays, and the two celebrated together when she aced her SATs.
Savchenko had been aiming for a big university in a big city, but Henderson encouraged her to consider a university closer to home: Her first impression of Furman was that it was “very calm, very comfortable,” and that it might not be as challenging.
Henderson told her, “College is going to be a stressful place for you. If you're comfortable there, that's not a bad thing.”
Thanks to Henderson's encouragement (she thought Anastasia would be a perfect fit for Furman), Savchenko was awarded a full scholarship.
“She excels in academics, she excels in drive, she excels in perseverance – everything we look for in a student,” said Emily Shook, Furman's vice president for enrollment management. “She's a great addition to our community.”
Savchenko embraced the liberal arts model and spent her first semester absorbing a wide range of subjects, especially mathematics, economics and data analysis.
“She's so happy when she talks about all her classes and professors,” Henderson said.
Keeping busy with classes helps Savchenko to stay tuned to what's happening inside Ukraine, where in addition to the dangers of war, her friends and family are living through the chaos of frequent power outages and water shortages.
“The war is still going on there and many people's lives depend on it,” she said.
And she found solace in sports.
Savchenko's passion for martial arts came out of a sense of obligation: Her younger brother had started taekwondo classes, but she was too nervous to go alone, so her parents asked her to accompany him until he was more comfortable.
“Then go back to your music studies and we won't bother you,” they told her.
That was 10 years ago. Savchenko started competing at age 9. She earned her black belt at 12 and won her first Ukrainian national championship. Since then, she's won eight more national titles, five World Cups, and a European championship.
When she left Ukraine, she lamented the loss of taekwondo, but a friend there introduced her to Tangsoo-do, a Korean martial art that, while the sparring is more precise and less contact than taekwondo, Savchenko felt an affinity with.
She misses the intensity of training in Ukraine but is grateful to the coaches here who are disciplined and respectful, rather than “scary and angry.”
“I'm really grateful for the opportunity to practice here,” she said. “This is my passion.”
As she adjusts to a new martial art and every aspect of the past two years, she tells herself, “This is not my choice, and it's beyond my control.”
However, some are not like that.
Her family continues to socialize weekly at English Crossing: Her father is still a student and her mother is a teacher. Savchenko works in the beginners class and her sister helps look after the children of the adult students. Savchenko has also invited her boyfriend, who teaches classes for Spanish speakers, to join her.
For her, there is a direct connection between her desire to give back to English Crossing and taekwondo, which emphasizes qualities such as integrity, perseverance and tenacity.
“It's like an engine inside of me that keeps me going,” she said.
