Nikola is an award-winning teacher and scholar. He teaches broadly on subjects related to the Ancient Mediterranean. Previous topics include Julius Caesar and his times, Greek and Roman mythology, Roman law, and others. He also teaches Latin and Ancient Greek languages at all levels.

In his scholarship, Nikola focuses on Latin prose literature and Roman cultural history. His recent and forthcoming publications center around Roman higher education, labor and competition in schools of rhetoric, and the history of use and circulation of written media among speakers of Latin.

Nikola speaks almost a dozen languages. Among them is Vlach—a small, unwritten, and rapidly disappearing Romance language used in the Balkans. In a project that is set to appear in print, Nikola helped to gather and process linguistic data, co-authoring the first scholarly book about this language.