Peace education

UWCSEA STORIES

Peace education

sharing our new global toolkit

Peace is at the heart of the UWC mission; we educate for peace through our K–12 curriculum and with a special focus in Grade 11, through our dedicated Initiative for Peace (IfP) programme. Through donations from the UWCSEA Annual Fund, we have developed an online peace education toolkit, sharing 20 years of knowledge and learning from IfP with schools globally. Nick Alchin, now Head of East Campus, says, “If you think of peace as the absence of war, then ‘educating for peace’ may seem rather daunting. But we know that war often erupts from conditions of social injustice, where some groups are marginalised or excluded, where human rights are endangered or curtailed. So if we extend the notion of peace to mean not just theabsence of war but also something more positive, you get an idea of what we are trying to do. We’re trying to look at how we develop social harmony, create a socially inclusive society and even look within ourselves to see what contributions we can make to these noble ends.” IfP is a year-long activity in Grade 11, where students explore concepts of peace and how to promote harmony between different groups. It culminates in a student-led Peace Conferences with peers, usually in Timor Leste and Mae Sot, Thailand. The learning and empowerment that comes out of IfP is transformational for both individuals and communities.

Several IfP alumni have gone on to run their independent peace conferences in their home countries.

“Facilitating IfP conferences significantly shaped my future career path and how I want to make a difference in the world. I’ve learned to be an empowering supporter, as opposed to an imposing leader.”

JULIA SCHETELIG ’18

Several educational institutions, including sister UWCs, have over the years noticed the powerful impact of IfP and asked UWCSEA for advice on creating similar programmes in their communities. In response, and with the help of donations to the UWCSEA Annual Fund, our years of institutional knowledge and experience were transformed into a virtual, multimedia IfP toolkit that is now accessible to any school in the world, for free, through the UWCSEA website. The toolkit is for both teachers and students and starts from the very basics of designing a peace education programme, all the way through to logistical details of running a conference. The toolkit for educators includes key concepts, schemes of work, facilitation notes and suggestions and is supplemented by a wealth of resources.

Thanks to donations to the UWCSEA Annual Fund, we are able to extend the reach of UWCSEA’s powerful educational programmes, such as IFP. Sharing access to education and empowering young people to take action for a peaceful future has never been more important. View the IfP Toolkit

OUR PLANET

Addressing issues of sustainability are a priority at the College and for Singapore. UWCSEA aims to make sustainability a significant part of every child’s education, evidenced by the way our learning programme has concepts of sustainable development embedded throughout, by the sheer number of eco-projects that our students initiate and support each year, as well as the ways in which we operate all aspects of our campuses.