December 3, 2019, in the House of Scientists of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine there was a scientific and cultural event — the Gala Academy "The World Was Catching Me But Didn't Catch...", which was held on the occasion of the 297th anniversary of Hryhoriy Skovoroda.

The organizers of the Gala Academy "The World Was Catching Me But Didn't Catch..." were the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Borys Oliynyk Ukrainian Culture Fund, Ukrainian Lingua-Information Fund of the NAS of Ukraine, and Kyiv House of Scientists of the NAS of Ukraine.

Within the framework of the event, the Ukrainian Dictionary Day was celebrated and the new edition of the Ukrainian Spelling approved by the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine (Resolution No. 437 of May 22, 2019), joint decision of the Presidium of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (Protocol No. 22/10 of October 24, 2018) and the Board of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine (Protocol No. 10/4-13 of October 24, 2018), approved by the Ukrainian National Spelling Commission (Protocol No. 5 of October 22, 2018), was presented.

Vice President of the NAS of Ukraine, Academician of the NAS of Ukraine Sergiy Ivanovych Pyrozhkov opened the Gala Academy with words of greeting from the President of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Academician of the NAS of Ukraine Borys Paton:

Dear colleagues! Dear friends!

Let me sincerely congratulate you, the participants of the Gala Academy "The World Was Catching Me But Didn't Catch...", which is being held on the occasion of the 297th anniversary of Hryhoriy Skovoroda's birthday!

The figure of Hryhoriy Skovoroda, a thinker, philosopher, educator and spiritually free person, embodies the best features of the Ukrainian people — the desire for knowledge, respect for science, liberty and tolerance.

I am pleased to note that as part of today's event, we are celebrating the Ukrainian Dictionary Day and presenting a new edition of the Ukrainian Spelling made by specialists of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine and the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine.

I wish all the participants of the Gala Academy "The World Was Catching Me But Didn't Catch..." good health and creative inspiration for carrying out your boldest plans for the benefit of Ukraine!

Yours sincerely,
President of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine
Academician of the NAS of Ukraine B. Paton

Kyiv, December 3, 2019

The Spiritual Anthem of Ukraine "God, Great, One!" (Lyrics by Alexander Konysky, music by Mykola Lysenko) had inspired the participants of the event to a creative evening. Academician Volodymyr Shyrokov announced the introductory speech, a researcher of the Ukrainian Lingua-Information Fund of NAS of Ukraine Margarita Nadutenko introduced the program of the event.

The second part of Ukrainian Dictionary Day was devoted to the presentation of published and electronic dictionaries of the Ukrainian Lingua-Information Fund, which could be viewed at the exhibition and during the presentation. Sergiy Panchenko, one of the inspirators of the Ukrainian Dictionary Day, told about its history and tradition.

The presentation of the new edition of Ukrainian Spelling was the third part of the Gala Academy. Co-chairman of the Ukrainian National Spelling Commission Professor Maxym Strikha, chairman of the Working Group on the drafting of the new edition, Corresponding Member of the NAS of Ukraine Svetlana Ermolenko, and members of the Working Group on drafting the New Spelling Anatoliy Zagnitko and Bohdan Azhnyuk presented authorized edition of Ukrainian Spelling 2019, emphasizing its high scientific standards and importance for Ukrainian society.

The fourth part of the event "Literary and Song Composition "Garden of Divine Songs" by Hryhoriy Skovoroda" (scriptwriter Vera Melnyk) was performed by the duets "Sisters Galyna and Lyudmyla Turchak" and "Music Space" (Igor Yakubovsky and Sergiy Moroz), enchanting the guests of the Gala Academy with a deep philosophy and unique poetry of the great Ukrainian thinker, whose thoughts, after almost three hundred years, are still very relevant. Volodymyr Shyrokov, Igor Yakubovsky and Sergiy Moroz, thank you for the music and wonderful tunes!

The fifth, final, part of the event was dedicated to the admitting Address of the participants of the Gala Academy to the Ukrainian leaders:

APPLICATION
OF PARTICIPANTS OF THE GALA ACADEMY

"THE WORLD WAS CATCHING ME BUT DIDN'T CATCH..."

TO THE PRESIDENT OF UKRAINE V. O. ZELENSKY,

PRIME MINISTER OF UKRAINE O. V. HONCHARUK,

CHAIRMAN OF THE VERKHOVNA RADA OF UKRAINE D. O. RAZUMKOV

HONORED

VOLODYMYR OLEKSANDROVYCH,

OLEXANDER VALERIYOVYCH,

DMUTRO OLEKSANDROVYCH!

We, the participants of the Gala Academy "The World Was Catching Me But Didn't Catch...", held on the occasion dedicated to the Birthday of Hryhoriy Skovoroda, on December 3, 2019, in the House of Scientists of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, appeal to you, senior leaders of the Ukraine, to emphasize the importance of humanitarian and spiritual directions of our national development at the modern, extremely turbulent stage of world civilization.

Issues of language and culture in the modern world are becoming increasingly important and significant. In addition to purely humanitarian factor, language becomes a technological factor too, which has a great impact on the development of digital network-centric civilization, becoming not only a culture factor, but also a factor of national security.

In Ukraine, due to efforts of leading scientists and specialists, a base of a national dictionary database have been created, which now has the status of a scientific object, which is the national property of Ukraine. The concept of the All-Ukrainian Linguistic Dialogue, designed to provide a conflict-free solution to language problems, has been formulated.

But it is necessary to take further steps towards a decisive raising of the level of intellectualization of information systems, progress in the field of creation of modern highly efficient tools and technologies for processing natural language information, integration into the world's linguistic and information space.

We are convinced that the future of Ukraine as an authoritative and respected highly-cultured country will be determined by the level of mastery of advanced technologies, first of all, linguistic ones.

We appeal to you, esteemed leaders of Ukraine, with the call:

• May we be worthy of the memory of the great Ukrainian educator-philosopher Hryhoriy Skovoroda!
• We ask you, the top leaders of Ukraine, to take decisive and effective measures in the field of development of highly intelligent linguistic technologies, which are the key to the modern civilizational evolution of Ukraine!

GALA ACADEMY
PARTICIPANTS OFFERS

"THE WORLD WAS CATCHING ME BUT DIDN'T CATCH..."

Kyiv, December 3, 2019

1. To approve and implement at the state level a set of measures for the period 2020–2022 for the purpose of commemorating Hryhoriy Skovoroda 300th anniversary (December 3, 1722).

2. Amend the Law of Ukraine "On Ensuring the Functioning of the Ukrainian Language as State Language" in the Jurisdiction and Powers of the National Commission on State Language Standards. In order to ensure proper scientific and methodological work level, subordinate the National Commission on State Language Standards to the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine and introduce it into the structure of the Academy.

3. In order to ensure the modern information level of state work in Ukraine, it is considered necessary to create a system of logical and linguistic expertise of the legal framework of Ukraine. Creation of the Linguistic Corpus of the regulatory framework of Ukraine and the State Thesaurus of Ukraine as a continuously evolving lexicographic system, the most complete semantic lexicon of linguistic units that function in the normative legal acts of Ukraine, to be considered the most important tasks of the Ukrainian state, its most important digital formations. In order to achieve these tasks at the appropriate scientific and technological level, to establish in the system of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine the Legal Framework Linguistic Expertise Institute.

4. Establish at the state level a system of social and scientific interaction — "All-Ukrainian Linguistic Dialogue" as a distributed socio-professional network of subjects and objects of the national linguistic-information process with the inclusion of modern virtualized tools of linguistic research, linguistic resources and linguistic infrastructure.

The Gala Academy skillfully combined the presentation of scientific achievements with literary and song compositions, that have special meaning for modern Ukraine.

We sincerely thank all the participants of the Gala Academy "The World Was Catching Me But Didn't Catch...", dedicated to Hryhoriy Skovoroda's 297th anniversary!

Good-bye until new scientific and creative meetings in a warm and cozy society of talented scientists and cultural figures!