A coalition of 41 organizations met on October 1st and 2nd in 2015 in Bogota, Colombia to discuss the current peace education curriculum in Colombia through 13 round table and small group discussions, civic and education leaders.
Problems and Purpose
Colombia decided that as a country, it would like to shift the public perception of it from a war-ridden and corrupt country to a peace oriented and education-investing political power. The purpose of their efforts were to transition the next generation of Colombians to be peace-making leaders for tomorrow and to guide the country in being a model to the rest of the world.
Background History and Context
Throughout its history, Colombia has been involved in war in some capacity: from the “War of Independence” from 1811-1819, the “Thousand Day War” from 1899 to 1902, to the current “Colombia-Venezuela Conflict” which began in 2009. Civic and education leaders from the (41) organizing parties decided that they would call a summit with the end goal being to work towards the national mission of establishing a peace-oriented society. They worked towards this goal by analyzing the current peace-curriculums in use by public institutions to determine their generalizability/replicability, how they could create more civic engagement opportunities, and how they could develop a culture of peace regardless of the regional differences.
Organizing, Supporting, and Funding Entities
The National Summit of Education for Peace was organized by the following individuals:
- María Alejandra Villamizar, Advisor of the Pedagogy for Peace group, of the Presidency of the Republic
- Kathleen Kerr, Deputy Chief of Mission of the IOM
- Marina Caireta of the School of Peace of the University of Barcelona
- Roberto Carlos Vidal, director of the Thinking Institute of the Pontificia Universidad
- Javeriana and representative of Redunipaz to the National Peace Council
- Amada Benavides, president of the Schools of Peace Foundation (Gomez, 2015).
These 5 individuals all agree upon the challenges of building peace in Colombia through education. There are no public documents that express the backstory of how these individuals met and/or came up with the idea of the National Summit of Education for Peace.
The complete list of involved organizations is as follows:
- Alianza Educación para la Construcción Culturas de Paz
- Asociación Nacional de Estudiantes Secundaristas ANDES
- Centro de MemoriaPaz y Reconciliación del Distrito
- Centro Nacional de Memoria Histórica
- Colectivo de Pensamiento y Acción MujeresPaz y Seguridad
- Comisión Colombiana de Juristas
- Consejería Presidencial para los Derechos Humanos
- Consejo Nacional de Paz
- Convenio Andrés Bello; Corporación Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano
- Corporación Universitaria Minuto de Dios
- Soypaz
- Corporación Viva La Ciudadanía
- Costurero de la Memoria
- Oficios de la Memoria del Centro de Memoria, Paz y Reconciliación Distrital
- Fundación Convivencia
- Centro de Investigación Educativa
- Fundación DOMOPAZ
- Fundación Escuelas de Paz
- Fundación Hanns Seidel
- Fundación para la Reconciliación; INDEPAZ
- Instituto Pensar
- Ministerio de Educación Nacional
- Movimiento Social de Discapacidad Colombia
- Movimiento Tú y La Paz / FEC Colombia
- Oficina del Alto Comisionado para la Paz
- OIM
- PNUD
- Pontificia Universidad Javeriana
- Facultad de Teología
- Maestría de Educación
- Red Javeriana de Transformación Social
- Facultad de Psicología
- Presidencia de la República
- Pedagogía para la Paz
- REDEPAZ; REDUNIPAZ
- Secretaría Distrital de CulturaRecreación y Deporte
- Secretaría de Educación del Distrito
- UNICEF
- Universidad de Cundinamarca
- Universidad de la Salle
- Universidad del Bosque
- Facultad de Jurídica y Política
- Universidad Pedagógica Nacional
- Universidad Santo Tomás Facultad Comunicación Social
- Maestría en Didáctica
- Maestría en Educación
- VUAD
- USAID (Gomez, 2015).
Each of these organizations were invited to participate by the founding group (Ms. Villamizar, Deputy Kerr, Ms. Caireta, Mr. Vidal, and Ms. Benavides).
Participant Recruitment and Selection
As mentioned, there are no public documents expressing how the founding group met and/or came up with the idea to host the Summit. The other participating organizations were invited to partake in the Summit.
Over 700 representatives, all from the 41 involved organizations were involved in the decision making processes of the Summit.
Methods and Tools Used
The 700+ representatives from the 41 host organizations worked within a series of 13 roundtable and small group discussions as well as informative panels. Each group was tasked with finding a resolution to their specific aspect of the National Agenda, which was to construct Public Policy of Education for Peace.
What Went On: Process, Interaction, and Participation
Decisions for the Summit were made unanimously within series of small group and roundtable discussions, as well as panels.
There were no extensive preparation requirements prior to the Summit. Within the participating organizations, there were governmental employees, non-governmental employees, students, teachers, and community advocates alike.
Round table and small group discussion themes were as follows:
- Topic 1: “Analysis of the current context of peace and its demands regarding education”
- “Agreements Havana and Edupaz”
- “Educational community and Edupaz”
- “Truth, memory and Edupaz”
- Topic 2: “Contents, didactic and pedagogies of education for peace” o “Relationships: Edupaz, Human Rights and Citizen”
- “Critical Pedagogies and Edupaz”
- Topic 3: “Approaches to the inclusion of education for peace” "Inclusion and Edupaz”
- “Victims, social reparation, and Edupaz”
- “Edupaz and the social State of Law”
- Topic 4: “Analysis and foresight on the progress and needs of education for peace at the regional level”
- “Nature rights, responsible consumption and Edupaz”
- “Edupaz and alternatives to the development model “
- “Territories, Ruralities, and Edupaz”
- “Resistance, social movements, and Edupaz”
- Topic 5: “National and regional educational policies for peace. Contributions for the consolidation of a national agenda for education for peace”
- “Articulations of agendas in Edupaz”
- “Tensions and bets in public policies and Edupaz” (Gomez, 2015).
Panels were hosted by the following individuals:
- Alcia Cabezudo, Argentina, vice president of the International Peace Bureau
- Marina Caireta, Coordinator of the Peace Education Program of the School of Culture of Peace, Autonomous University of Barcelona
- David Adams, director of the United Nations for the International Year of the Culture of Peace
- Mario López, director of the Institute of Peace and Conflicts of the University of Granada.
- Janet Gerson, director of education at the International Institute on Peace Education
- Carlos Eduardo Martínez, Uniminuto Teacher, director of the Master's Degree in Citizenship, Peace and Development.
(Gomez, 2015).
By the end of the Summit, all participating organizations unanimously signed the “National Pact for Peace Education”. The Pact serves as a reminder to the National Agenda to construct Public Policy of Education for Peace and is currently in the implementation process.
Influence, Outcomes, and Effects
The Summit ended with the unanimous signing of the National Pact for Peace Education which serves as reminder to the National Agenda of constructing Public Policy of Education for Peace; however in addition to creating space for Peace Education in Colombia, the Pact sought to “define common inter-institutional, comprehensive work routes that encompass national, regional and local scenarios to overcome various forms of direct, structural and cultural violence and allow the establishment of a culture of peace, beyond the ceasefire and agreements” (Gomez, 2015).
Analysis and Lessons Learned
The National Pact for Peace Education is currently being implemented in various locations throughout Colombia, therefore we do not have any data to report at this time.
See Also
References
BBC News. (2018) Colombia Profile-Timeline. BBC News. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-19390164
Semple, K., Casey N. (2016) Colombia and Rebels Want Peace, but How Has Never Been Less Clear. The New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/05/world/americas/colombia-farc-rebels-peace.html
Gomez, Y. (2015) National Meeting of Education for Peace. El Encuentro Nacional de Educación para la Paz. Retrieved from: http://encuentronacionaldeeducacionparalapaz.blogspot.com/?view=classic
External Links
Pogrebinschi, T. (2017) LATINOO Dataset https://latinno.net/en/case/5128/
Notes
“Edupaz” refers to the concept of educational peace, derived from the Spanish terms “educación”.
The original submission of this case entry was written by Christian Canizales, a Master of Public Service candidate at the University of Arkansas Clinton School of Public Service. The views expressed in the current version are those of the authors, editors, or cited sources, and are not necessarily those of the University of Arkansas Clinton School of Public Service.
