United Nations - University for Peace – Costa Rica -
Peace Education – Graduate Program
In recent years, there has been a growing, world-wide recognition of the central role played by education in meeting the complex demands of peacemaking and peace building. Often lacking, however, are individuals prepared with the knowledge and skills to act as leaders for educational reform to support sustainable peace processes.
The UPEACE Master's Degree Programme in Peace Education is designed to train such individuals. The programme will build the capacity of educators from around the world to contribute to educational, social, and cultural change through peace education. It is designed to enable participants to effectively engage in peace education at all levels, from the design of educational policy to the development of effective and culturally relevant peace education programmes, to the actual skills of teaching for peace both in and out of the classroom.
The programme assumes that a peace educator must have a broad knowledge of the basic concepts and skills within the multidisciplinary areas that converge in contemporary peace studies. Graduates of the programme will also be specialists in the application of the insights of peace studies within the broader social and cultural environments within which formal and non-formal education take place. The centerpiece of the programme is the project development process. While participating in the UPEACE Peace Education Programme, peace education students will work on the development of an educational project that can be immediately applicable in an educational setting of the student's choosing.
Objectives The MA in Peace Education Programme designates two main interdependent learning outcomes to be pursued:
-1.To prepare leaders and specialists committed to the building of a culture of peace and non-violence by educational means (formal, non formal and informal settings);
-1.To support students in developing competence in analyzing, developing, and reforming curricula, didactic methods, pedagogies, and educational resources for a comprehensive view of peace education.
Student entry profile The UPEACE Peace Education Programme is particularly suitable for persons who are interested in peace education oriented educational policy and development, administration and evaluation, both in public and private educational settings, as well as teachers and professors interested in peace oriented pedagogy. It is also suitable for educators interested in community education.
Admission to the Master’s Degree Program in Peace Education will be open to a limited number of qualified students who have completed a bachelor’s degree or equivalent at an accredited higher education institution and who demonstrate an active interest in the field of Peace Education. Preferably students will have had prior studies in an education related discipline and previous education work experience.
Programme Outline
TERM 1
CreditsIPS 6000 Foundation Course in Peace & Conflict Studies / 3
PEP 6010 Peace Education Theory & Practice / 3
PEP 6012 Human Rights Education / 3
GPB 6033 Cultures & Learning; From Violence towards Peace / 3
PEP 6020 Research Methods / 3
TERM 2
CreditsElective Course / 3
PEP 6040 Sustainable Development Education / 3
PEP 6070 Education for Conflict Transformation and Peace Building / 3
PEP 6080 Language, Media & Peace / 2
PEP 6061 Peace Education: Strategies for Life & Action / 3
PEP 6051Practices of Conflcit Management and Peacebuilding / 3
TERM 3
CreditsINDEPENDENT RESEARCH PROJECT OR PRACTICUM / 7
TOTAL PROGRAMME CREDITS / 39
Course Descriptions
PCS-6000 Foundation in Peace and Conflict Studies 3 credits UPEACE Faculty
The University for Peace Foundation Course in Peace and Conflict Studies is designed to engage students in an examination of the major contemporary challenges to peace, sources of conflict and violence, and several key nonviolent mechanisms for conflict transformation and prevention. The course is designed to provide a common foundation for UPEACE students from all of the different M.A. programs (as its name suggests). During the course, an understanding of the complex and interconnected challenges to peace will be developed, as will an understanding of the need for multi-faceted approaches to meeting these challenges. Students will also engage critically with theories of conflict, and will develop their understanding of the theoretical resources available in the area of conflict studies. During the course of their studies at UPEACE students will engage in increasingly specialized inquiry into various dimensions and issues in their specific MA areas. The foundation course provides an opportunity to explore connections, sympathies, and synergies between the challenges and approaches identified in all of these areas from a “wide-angle” perspective that will encourage students to continue making such interdisciplinary connections and analyses throughout their tenure at UPEACE and after.
PEP-6010 Peace Education: Theory and Practice 3 credits Professor Virginia Cawagas
Drawing on ideas, perspectives, and experiences from diverse contexts this courseseeks to provide students with a holistic and critical understanding of the theory and practice of peace education. Essentially, the course content and processes will explore a range of conceptual/analytical perspectives and encourage students to reflect on the possibilities and challenges of educating for peace in a world of complex and escalating conflicts and violence.
PEP 6012: Human Rights Education This blended (online and face-to-face) course will explore and introduce the programming approaches, the teaching and learning resources and related theory and practice of the international field of human rights education.
PEP-6033 Cultures and Learning: From Violence towards Peace 3 credits Professor Tony Jenkins
This course has two primary learning goals. The first is to develop a deep and critical understanding of the underlying causes of violence by examining the origins of violence in the human community to its current institutionalized presence. This inquiry is an essential step in acquiring the necessary knowledge, skills and capacities to be able transform the institutions and unquestioned beliefs that promote and sustain systems of direct and indirect violence. We will give special attention to the lenses of militarism; socio-economics and patriarchy (gender) as meta-culprits/cultural reproducers of a system of violence.
The second goal is to develop a deep sense and awareness of how we (collectively and individually) learn and the relationship of learning to change. In so doing we will examine a variety existing literature on the philosophy of education and educational change. Special emphasis will be given to inquiring into the formation of our own attitudes and beliefs.
PEP-6020 Research Methods 3 credits Professor Eliana Carvalho
This course will develop student’s theoretical knowledge and applied skills in conducting qualitative, quantitative and participatory research in the fields of peace building and conflict analysis and resolution, with a strong emphasis on gender issues and their cultural implications.
PEP-6080 Language, Media, and Peace 2 credits Professor Eliana Carvalho
Language, Media, and Peace will provide a critical methodology for recognizing how language communicates and reinforces ideologies that sustain social institutions and practices antithetical to a culture of peace. It will also provide an overview of how language can contribute to the escalation or de-escalation of conflict and consider language policies in education to determine whether and, if so, how they violate linguistic rights and promote inequality.
PEP-6061 Peace Education: Strategies for Life and Action3 credits Professor Alicia Cabezudo
This course focuses on practical strategies and tools for promoting peace education in formal educational systems, as well as community settings. Topics include the introduction of peace education into curricula and materials development; school system reform: roles, accountability and politics; teacher education and training strategies: pre-service and in-service; movements and organizations supporting educational reform (NGOs, teachers' and parents' organizations); the relationship between schools and other community and cultural organizations (the media, religious organizations, the arts, the health sector, etc.) in cooperation for the promotion of peace education; advocacy strategies and skills for educational reform, emphasizing strategies for motivating teachers and education officials for change; and the use of information technology and networking.
PEP-6070 Education for Conflict Transformation and Peacebuilding 3 credits Professor Thomas Mark Turay
This course will provide a basic understanding of the nature of protracted social conflicts as a framework for appreciating the role that education can play in conflict management and transformation. It will provide practical skills development in defining goals, strategies and pedagogical principles for developing peace education in these contexts. The course will stress innovative approaches for introducing the principles of non-violent strategic action and conflict intervention into various formal and informal educational settings, and actual hands-on training in designing and integrating non-violent action and conflict intervention in personal, professional, and social settings. Finally, attention will be given to the role of education in the prevention of violent conflict.
PEP-6051 Practices of Conflict Management and Peacebuilding 3 credits Professor Matthew Norton
In the first part of the course we will first look at the Conflict Resolution approach to theorizing conflict, understanding its origins, the vocabularies for speaking of conflict in ways that “get to the heart of the issue” and focusing on the root causes. Then we will move on to a critique of what talking in these ways fails to say – and with what repercussions – about gender, power, privilege, and difference. The second part of the course addresses various responses to conflict. The third part looks at peace processes and the challenges presented by the concept of peace building.
PEP-6040 Sustainable Development Education
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