More than 60 faculty from 19 colleges, universities and other organizations traveled to the University of Notre Dame last week to attend the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies’ second annual Summer Institute for faculty, “Teaching Peace in the 21st Century.”
The week-long institute, held June 13 to 18, was created in response to growing interest in peace studies at the college and university level. Participants came from Notre Dame and other institutions in the United States, Colombia and Israel, including: Abilene Christian University, Arizona State University, Austin Community College, Caribbean Citizens’ Reconciliation Commission, Coastal Carolina University, College of the Holy Cross, Marquette University, Norwalk Community College, Nyack College, Oklahoma City University, Portland Community College, St. Norbert College, United States Institute of Peace, University of Haifa, University of Louisville, University of Massachusetts Lowell, University of Tennessee Knoxville, and Valencia Community College.
The Summer Institute was created to guide teams of faculty seeking to launch or expand peace studies programs. George A. Lopez, an internationally recognized authority on peace studies program development, led the institute, along with about a dozen faculty and staff from the Kroc Institute.
About 400 colleges and universities around the world offer peace studies programs at the undergraduate level. Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute is unique in higher education for its combination of a substantive research agenda and degree programs at all levels — doctoral, master’s and undergraduate. The Kroc Institute’s nearly 25-year history and faculty who are pioneers in the field position Kroc to help academic institutions with peace studies programs at every stage of development.
Originally published by at newsinfo.nd.edu on June 22, 2010.