Archive

This two-day highly interactive workshop focused on providing participants with an in-depth understanding of intercultural communication and its significance in conflict resolution education. Participants were introduced to, and participated in, the use of the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) and Intercultural Conflict Style Inventory (ICS). The IDI is a cross-cultural tool for assessing intercultural competence at the individual, group and organizational level. With the IDI and the ICS, individuals identify strategies for resolving conflict across cultural and ethnic differences, identify personal approaches to resolving cross cultural difference, and assess the strengths and weaknesses of each intercultural conflict style. Participants reflected on their current level of cultural communication and conflict competency.

The strategy, Education for Global and Multicultural Citizenship: A Strategy for Victorian Government Schools, provides tools and resources for the inclusion of multicultural and global perspectives in primary and secondary schools throughout the state of Victoria, Australia. This interactive workshop will provide an overview of implementation from classroom practice and pedagogy to whole school and systems change. Current approaches to human rights education, including indigenous perspectives and conflict resolution education, will be included.

This panel shares the experience of two organizations working on Peace and Conflict Resolution Education in Mexico, for more than 15 years. Lessons learned and challenges encountered in a highly multicultural, conflictive and complex context will be presented, both within and outside the formal education system. As strategies are developed intercultural challenges as well as conflicts within and without institutions are important to consider.

Faculty and students from the university are actively engaged in evaluation and interdisciplinary practice at a public school serving immigrant and refugee children ages 9-20. Within this context, an assessment of faculty’s beliefs and strategies concerning diversity were evaluated. The findings included several reoccurring themes around diversity. This information will be presented with recommendations for organizations to encourage diversity while pointing out its benefits.

Engaged scholarship is about merging the academy and broader civic community. Students inform scholarship through civic action. But, increasingly, students are entering and departing the academy unprepared for civic engagement; a process that is best integrated throughout students’ education process. The focus of engaged-scholarship in higher education at the end of the formal learning continuum is not enough. A model of integrative learning is explored with discussion regarding the role of the academy as a leader in the change process.

This field study evaluated prevention efforts in bullying among elementary-school students by promoting pro-social behavior. Teachers of fourth, fifth, and sixth grade students, promoted “actively caring” (AC) behavior in their students. The study results will be shared and their impact on interpersonal bullying, victimization, and observed bullying which decreased significantly, indicating the effectiveness of a positive approach to undesirable behavior.

This workshop will examine the potential of sports, live action role playing (LARP), and table top games as a mechanism to engage students in difficult topics through reflection on shared experiences and developing a shared narrative in a competitive, but semi-structured and non-threatening environment. An overview of existing theory and practice in this area and some case examples of projects and curricula developed for K-12 schools and refugee communities will be shared. Sports and gaming provide a unique enjoyable forum for children, youth, and young adults to practice and reflect on CRE and peace building skills.

Gain skills and discover resources to teach in a manner that is unbiased and non- prejudicial, and receive tools to create an inclusive classroom learning experience for all learners. The program will incorporate: interactive learning and teaching; diverse facilitators and presenters; new and enduring theories of diversity awareness and social justice education; and historical and social perspectives of diversity issues.

Impartial mediation requires a mediator to self-examine and identify unconscious biases that can affect the mediation process. For Elder Mediation training, self-examination delves into aging and disability-related biases and perceptions, assumptions about capacity, and judgments about the mental and physical effects of aging. This workshop will present information about 1) how to uncover bias in oneself, 2) the most common age-based biases held and why we have them, and 3) will discuss some creative ways that elder mediation training helps mediators self-assess and bring the unconscious to the surface for thoughtful examination.

This workshop offers strategies and activities to implement healing change. Focused on the field of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) — the law applied during times of armed conflict — a brief history of IHL in relation to the torture and treatment of prisoners of war will be shared. Aspects of victims needs and consequence assessments will be investigated as well as the enforcement of regulations mechanisms, processes for redress of grievances, reconciliation of perpetrators and victims, and how the ultimate act of forgiveness are played-out in the world as well as at the local level. Materials are free and downloadable from the American Red Cross.

Guidelines and restrictions on warfare have been developed and applied by the international community. The necessity of IHL will be traced to its ever-increasing contemporary involvement. Since inception, the purpose has been twofold: 1) to reduce the devastation caused by war and 2) to protect the dignity of man. The Geneva Conventions and the International Committee of the Red Cross were established to wrestle with the above-listed concerns. How materials and exercises in the free American Red Cross curriculum can also be applied to situations of inter-personal conflict, gang issues, and harmful social defiance will also be shared.

Conflict Management Education is a pre-requisite for fostering Democratic Education and Democratic Practices in all sectors of a democratic society. The Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Local Government have been partnering to foster a peaceful society through workshops in Conflict Resolution Education and Youth Governance and Youth Engagement, with training in part provided by Global Issues Resource Center, Cuyahoga Community College. This workshop will focus on what has been done re: training, policy formulation, implementation of strategies and involvement of youth in the process of promoting peace. It shall also highlight some of the challenges encountered.

Conflict Resolution Education in Teacher Education (CRETE) is a grant-funded project designed to provide training to pre-service and in-service teachers in CRE and to enhance new teachers’ CRE and classroom management skills. An important component of the CRETE training is its focus on bullying prevention and intervention, an issue which has come to the forefront of education in recent years. This session will provide information regarding characteristics of bullying, including cyberbullying, and offer research-based strategies for creating environments that minimize the potential for bullying to occur, as well as offering comprehensive methods for understanding and intervening on incidents of bullying.