[CivilSoc] Conflict Transformation Summer Course

[Eline Potoski]

Conflict Transformation Across Cultures (CONTACT): Summer Peacebuilding Institute (May 31 - Jun 18 2004) Start Date: May 31, 2004 Location: Brattleboro, Vermont, USA 
The CONTACT Summer Peacebuilding Institute is a two or three week residential educational and experiential training that focuses on the professional development of peacebuilders and their communities, offering core skills and practical tools for analysing and responding to conflict in intergroup, communal, and public life. Through the creation of an engaged and active learning community, the programme strives to foster both a reflective awareness and hands-on competence required to guide the process of reconstructing and reconciling broken group relations. 
The programme utilises a participatory, experiential approach that includes case studies, simulations, role-plays, group work, and other innovative educational methods. Drawing upon the direct experiences of participants as well as faculty, CONTACT explores ways to confront the past, intervene in the present, and create a shared vision for a secure and sustainable common future. 
CONTACT Offers: 
A theoretical foundation in the political, structural, and psychological sources and dynamics of violent conflict 
Practical, hands-on training, including classroom and field-based coursework; 
Skills development in conflict analysis, coexistence, and transformative interventions; 
Enhancement of interpersonal, leadership, and technological skills and competencies; 
Continuous support, supervision, and feedback from faculty and peers; 
Creation of a network of international peacebuilders assisting each other across cultures in conflict. 
Appropriate candidates for this programme include professionals in community development, human service or religious organisations, schools, public agencies, and other nongovernmental or nonprofit organisations who have a solid foundation in human relations skills and a strong commitment to coexistence and the transformation of intercultural conflicts. 
Click here </redirect.cgi?r=http://www.sit.edu/contact/institute/index.html> for more information. 
Registration Details:
The tuition is approximately US$1850 and $765 for room and board for the full three-week program and earns three graduate credits from the School for International Training.
Third week course electives may be taken individually for one credit each at a costs of $600. The following courses are offered during the third week: 
Media and Peacebuilding with Search for Common Ground
This course will explore professional practices in using media to promote the peaceful resolution of conflicts including the principles of peace media and the broad range of media tools that can be used for peacebuilding. Participants will also gain an understanding of the production process in broadcast media and intended-outcome programming. Each participant will design a media project adapted to their work and environment.
Francis Rolt and Oussama K. Safa work with Search for Common Ground as trainers in conflict resolution and media, and have extensive professional experience with peace media. 
Reconciliation and Forgiveness 
Instructors Joseph Sebarenzi and Vahidin Omanovic speak with personal authority when they teach about reconciliation and forgiveness. Joseph is a survivor of the Rwandan genocide and Vahidin lived through the genocide in Bosnia. They have spent years observing and reflecting on the process of reconciliation. 
The course will explore concepts and applications of reconciliation as currently applied in peacebuilding. Participants will reflect on their capacities for forgiveness and reconciliation in inter-personal and inter-communal relations, and will develop working drafts of reconciliation models for particular regions, conflicts and circumstances. 
Compassionate listening: Healing Our World from the Inside Out
This course focuses on the fundamentals of Compassionate Listening and provides the skills and practice necessary to bring this technique into your daily life, including listening and speaking from the heart in challenging situations. Listening to the "other" is challenging to the degree that pain and misunderstanding exist. With intention, open-hearted listening creates a true foundation for reconciliation and peace.
Instructor Leah Green is founder and director of The Compassionate Listening Project and internationally recognized as a leader in Jewish-Palestinian reconciliation. 
Fundamentals of Fundraising 
This course is an intensive, participatory learning program that helps civil society professionals develop the skills needed to prepare successful grant proposals. The experiential learning methodology deals with all essential aspects of grant-based fundraising, from project design and donor relationships to the production of polished, compelling proposals. 
Participants come to the workshop with a proposal they hope to develop, whether still at an early conceptualization stage, or an actual proposal to an identified donor interested in peacebuilding. During the workshop they will directly apply concepts learned to their real-life funding needs under the tutelage of instructors Carrol and Jonathan Otto. 
Applications due by April 15, 2004. 
Contact Information:
Eline Potoski
Co-Manager, Conflict Transformation Across Cultures Program
School for International Training, World Learning Institute
Kipling Road, PO Box 676
Brattleboro, VT 05302, USA
Tel: 802-258-3598
Fax: 802-258-3320
eline.potoski at sit.edu <mailto:eline.potoski at sit.edu>
summerinstitute at sit.edu <mailto:summerinstitute at sit.edu>
contact at sit.edu <mailto:contact at sit.edu>
CONTACT Website </redirect.cgi?r=http://www.sit.edu/contact/>