Paxeducare’s Blog

Now that the holidays are approaching and the end of the New Year is almost here, it is a good time to take stock of where Pax Educare has been, and where we may be headed. I am grateful to all those who have hung in with us these several years, through growth and changes, nurtured by the common spirit of the importance of educating for peace.

We continue to extensively network and build coalitions and connections of like-minded educators and individuals, both in formal (schools and colleges) and informal, community based programs. We are called to support and promote to put into practice the pedagogical principles that will sustain our world in the years to come. This involves educating for justice, for ecological sustainability, for peace and economic growth that serves all people, not just global corporate and governmental interests and modeling the kind of teaching we hope to impart. The “how and why” of our teaching is at least as important as the “what”. More and more I am called to focus on a mission of the written word and am grateful that a reduction in grant administration responsibilities is giving me good opportunities to focus on writing and getting back into some theoretical reading and research, some of it laid down since graduate school.

An office move to the third floor of my row house has helped simplify some of the administrivia of running an office. With lower overall operating expenses and less grant adminitration, there is freedom of time and energy to asses “next steps”, always a good thing as an organization evolves.

Coordination of the HIPP (Help Increase the Peace) youth and adult workshops continues, on a reduced scale, as active grant solicitation and support has waned, an intentional downsizing to reduce time spent on tracking grant funds. Increasingly we are looking to partner and collaborate for these kinds of workshops with other organizations and individuals. So please get in touch. I feel it important to not stay too focused on merely the theoretical!

People with whom we are in contact have given feedback that they are grateful for and enjoy reading the Pax Educare newsletter. This will remain a key part of what Pax Educare does.

Please consider supporting Pax Educare. January 8 will be our annual benefit concert, a living room event with the Adaskin String Trio and pianist Sally Pinkas. This has become a cherished tradition. Visit our web site for details.

                After spending a week in Ukraine, followed by a week in Budapest and then a week in Austria, I am still integrating the many experiences of learning, seeing and doing in this 3+ weeks, particularly as they relate to issues of war, violence, oppression and peace.  I was grateful for the IIPE, which came during the middle of these experiences and gave me a chance to learn first-hand of the wonderful work of so many peace educators around the world. Yet questions remain-what is this need we humans have do dominate others? How can it be so easy to dehumanize the “other”? How can we educate toward “rehumanization” and toward the preciousness of human life? Clearly morals and ethics must play a part.

Two books I read during this time heightened my awareness of historical and cultural issues,  one set in  Ukraine and in one in the Austria-Hungarian empire of the 18^th, 19^th and 20^th century. Borderlands by Anna Reid, is a compelling history of Ukraine and an apt title for a region that has known little peace since its founding as a Rus kingdom in the 9^th century AD. Sitting strategically between western Europe and the Soviet empire of the east. Ukraine has only experienced independence as a nation twice, once in the 1920s for a very few years, and now again is struggling to define itself, having gained its freedom from the Soviet Union in 1991. Reading the book is like struggling from one slaughter to the next, with civilians victimized from early times, the worst being during the Stalin area of collectivization  and then the Second World War, when Ukraine lost more victims than the Nazi Holocaust, some estimates are above 20 million.

The other book is The Radetzky March  by Joseph Roth, which is a novel set in the waning days of the Austria-Hungarian empire, beginning in the late 1700s and concluding as World War I begins. It is a multi-generational tale, leading  to the final story of the struggles of a soldier who  must claim obedience to an oppressive system of militarization and the consequences of this to his own sense of identity and morality. It portrays the futility of war.

Complementing these two books is one I picked up in a Vienna coffee shop which had a few English language used paperbacks for sale. Queen  is the multi-generational story of the American author Alex Haley’s father’s family. Queen was his paternal grandmother, who was a slave before, during and after the civil war. The family’s white ancestors trace to one Irish immigrant, who established huge plantations in Tennessee and Alabama. The book, in raw form, takes us through the many horrific injustices inherent in a white dominated system. Yet there is courage and redemption that we see again and again.

Everywhere in Eastern Europe are reminders of war. We here in the United States have our war monuments, but in Europe war is real in a sense that in the US it is one step removed. Every village has its memorial. The small town where my daughter, Gretchen, lives in Ukraine, Korop, has its memorial to the Afghan War-not the current one,  which is our  war here in the US, but the Soviet-Afghan war of the 1980s. Here is a picture of a  memorial to WWII in Korop.

I think, perhaps, the most powerful experience I had was a visit to the former Nazi concentration camp of Mauthausen, in Austria. During the third week of the 3+ week trip, while bicycling down the path along the Danube, my husband and I drove off of the trail, partway up a very steep road, walking the remainder of the way to the top of a mountain, one of the most beautiful setting imaginable, if you look out and not back at the remains of the Nazi death camp. Looking down we saw the remnants of the gravel pit, where the work of excavating was done by the camp inmates, many of whom worked to their deaths. The barracks, gas chamber, crematorium are left just as they were. There is a sense of unreality to it-how could the unthinkable really have happened here, right out in the open? Who knew of the participants in the surrounding countryside? Part of the camp has now been made into a memorial. Yet questions remain…is a memorial enough to keep our hearts and minds from the doing the unthinkable?

The IIPE (International Institutes on Peace Education-see previous entry on the proceedings) set in Budapest, whose theme was human rights education, gave us as participants a chance to learn first-hand what are the human rights issues that Hungary is facing.  We learned during one of the plenaries of the plight of the Roma people (Gypsies), who have historically been marginalized and are particularly hard-hit during this time that the local Hungarian hosts call  “The Crisis”.  Still politically somewhat fragile, Hungary has embraced its entrance into the European Union and is beginning to face some aspects of the darker side of history. And again, through hearing what educators and practitioners are doing around the globe, I learned that there is great hope, there is great courage, to fight oppression and injustice.

I just returned from almost a month away with my husband, visiting our daughter in Ukraine, where she is posted in the Peace Corps, then to IIPE in Budapest and then a week’s bike trip in Austria. One thing that came clear to me is the tangible evidence in Eastern Europe of war. War memorials are everywhere. Keeping that in mind, it was a phenomenal experience, once again, to attend IIPE for my third experience. IIPE is an intentional gathering of about 60 peace educators from around the world, held each year at a different site, who build community while learning from shared experiences, putting into practice the pedagogy of peace. The gathering is kept intentionally small so that community building can take place and real relationships nurtured. At the end of each of the 6 days, we gather in the same small groups, to reflect upon our shared learnings. It is very difficult to choose which workshops to go to, as they run simultaneously. Plenaries are moderated by several of the participants. The philosophy of IIPE is that there are no so-called “experts” needed from outside, that the learning can come within our community. So we  may see  certain folks speaking during one of the plenaries, participating in a workshop and a reflection group, and taking part in a hilarious skit at Cultural Night. IIPE combines fun and laughter with serious purpose. It has, unfortunately, made it very difficult for me to wish to attend any other professional gatherings-none can quite match up. Thanks are due to organizers Tony Jenkins and Janet Gerson of the Peace Education Center at Teachers College, and to Eva Nagy of the EJBO Foundation in Hungary.

The theme of this year’s IIPE was “Human Rights Learning as Peace Education: Pursuing Democracy in a Time of Crisis”. Plenaries and workshops reflected this theme. We heard in plenaries some philosophical underpinnings for human rights and democratic education, learned about the issues with the Roma people (Gypsies), about education for rural women in India, visioning a new kind of peace playground, human rights teacher training in Mexico, justice issues in Palestine-Israel, with women and education in Afghanistan and with the oil rich region of Nigeria. These, together with all of the other experiences, are truly a lot to integrate. Such inspiring work, and I was especially inspired by the creative spirit and endeavors of so many of the young adults present.

All workshops are experiential.  I attended a most interesting one led by Fr. CP Anto, who is doing peace education in the highly conflicted area of Nagaland. Another was led by a Norwegian peace educator, Anne Margrete Halvorsen, who shared with us, among other things, her work with a bridge program between Norwegian and Pakistani schools. A workshop on philosophy and world order and one on pedagogy, writing and peace education rounded out the week.

Participants in Fr. Anto's Workshop on the conflicts in Nagaland, India and his work in peace education

I led a workshop entitled “Mysticism and the Poetic: Language and Unlanguage: Transforming Conceptions of Human Rights, Peace Pedagogy and Democracy”. This will be posted soon on the Pax Educare web site.

IIPE Founder Betty Reardon with Eva Nagy, local IIPE host

Thanks to several generous grants this year, we have been able to offer many workshops for youth and adults, teaching the skills of nonviolence and leadership development, using a program first developed by Quakers, the Help Increase the Peace program (HIPP). Here is a description of HIPP from the Pax Educare web site, with information taken from the American Friends Service Committee

What is HIPP? (Used with permission from the website of the American Friends Service Committee www.afsc.org.)

“The Help Increase the Peace Program, known as HIPP, teaches young people and adults communication skills for conflict resolution. And it does more. HIPP confronts prejudice and renews our hope to be agents for positive social change. The training introduces alternatives to violence and bullying and allows participants to practice various options by modeling and role playing. Exercises include self-affirmation and discovery of how insensitivity can magnify problems.

HIPP was developed by the American Friends Service Committee staff in Syracuse, New York, in 1991 as a youth-oriented program to address the epidemic of violence in schools. HIPP is based on the conviction that nonviolence and participation in our communities can better each of us and our world.

Workshops focus on three themes: options to violence; dealing with racism, prejudices, and our differences; and the belief that we can each participate in our communities to bring about positive social change.

HIP training is composed of three levels of workshops, each three days long, with increases in skill. Or you can become a facilitator by participating in the five-day summer institute.

The building blocks of the workshops are affirmation, communication, cooperation, conflict resolution, and prejudice reduction.

HIPP uses cooperative games, discussions, role-playing, and lively group activities to build skills.

A number of young people who have gone through HIPP have become workshop leaders or assistants. HIPP facilitators are of various ages, races, and genders– reflecting the different audiences of HIPP.

HIPP has been effectively applied in middle and high schools where administrators, teachers, and staff members enjoyed and praised the program. It has also been used with adults and mixed ages in community centers, church basements, offices, and on college campuses. HIPP teaches leadership skills, builds community, and increases participants’ self-esteem. It is, by design, fun, easy to replicate, and can be adapted for different audiences and situations. HIPP can go anywhere! “

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We are grateful to our funders who have helped underwrite the costs of the HIPP Program:

Biosophical Institute,
The Hartford Courant Foundation,
The Ensworth Charitable Trust,
Bank of America, Trustee

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A Help Increase the Peace (HIPP) Workshop –

• Is dynamic, interactive and fun! Experience first, discussion second.
• Builds self-esteem, confidence to resist peer pressure and impulse control.
• Gives positive strategies to deal with conflict.
• Develops creative problem solving with practice and role-plays.
• Demonstrates that violence is not the answer.
• Helps people make a difference in their lives and their communities.

   

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Pax Educare HIPP Workshops

Pax Educare coordinates the HIPP activities in the greater Hartford area. Contact us if you are interested in hosting a training or participating in our 08-09 workshops. There is a greater HIPP network e list which is international. To sign up, contact us.

 

 

See More Photos from Past HIPP Program in our Photo Gallery 

http://www.paxeducare.org/Gallery/PaxGallery.html

As director of the Connecticut Center for Peace Education, I have decided to expand our presence in cyberspace and enter the world of blogging. Pax Educare is a small resource center for the research, study and teaching of peace located in Hartford, CT. We promote the idea that pedagogical processes and skills are crucial to peacebuilding and to develop the kind of world we want for our children and grandchildren. We hope to use this site for a peaceful exchange of ideas and resources.

Along with the board chair of Pax Educare, I just returned from Cleveland, OH and Case Western Reserve University, where 170 peace educators from many different settings (K-12, community, academic, NGOs, grass-roots) gathered to design a protype for a National Peace Academy, to be housed at Case Western. This is an exciting endeavor and one which will move forward a Culture of Peace. For more information on the NAP, go to www.nationalpeaceacademy.us.

We continue to offer intergenerational workshops on nonviolence and leadership, using the HIPP (Help Increase the Peace) program, first developed by Quakers and the American Friends Service Committee. If you would like more information on HIPP, please contact us.

We also promote peace pedagogy in many different settings and offer consultation on resources worldwide.