Jamaicans Can Pursue Peace Studies At IUC

The International University of the Caribbean (IUC) Peace Institute and Extended Learning Centre (PIELC) is a unique initiative that seeks to address the root causes of crime and violence in the society through targeted studies and research to promote sustainable peace in communities.

Officially launched on March 17, the objectives of the IUC Peace Institute are to develop quality research methodologies; strengthen the peace resiliency of children and youth, women and men, families, and communities; influence the shaping of public policies; respond to gender-based violence through research in family violence; address violence in the virtual communities and build partnerships for peace.

Students can pursue Peace Studies as an academic discipline at the certificate, diploma, and bachelor levels.

In January 2022, the IUC rolled out its full suite of peace programmes, aspects of which are being incorporated across all programmes offered by the University.

The Peace Studies degree programme, which is being offered in partnership with the Dispute Resolution Foundation, incorporates courses in mediation, conflict resolution and negotiation, peace-building advocacy, child resiliency and wellness, family life education, victim-offender dialogue, and violence interruption approaches.

Senior Director at the IUC with Responsibility for the PIELC, Marcia Hextall, tells JIS News that the Centre provides academic and community engagement education and training, aimed at promoting and maintaining peace in Jamaica.

“Peace study courses are being infused in the degrees at the IUC, and then there are partnerships with the Child Resiliency Programme [administered by the Violence Prevention Alliance (VPA)], in offering a course that they have developed and piloted in a number of community groups with which the IUC interfaces. That [partnership] will also deliver programmes at the graduate and undergraduate level in wellness and resiliency, and building peace,” she informs.

The partnership with the Jamaica Resiliency Programme also aims to engage with schools, families, and health services to build a broad network of protection for young people.

Ms. Hextall tells JIS News that “there are negotiations with a number of universities globally to offer courses in peace studies as joint ventures, to persons in Jamaica. That is going on at the graduate and undergraduate levels”.

The PIELC also includes a research component, which will see the utilisation of scientific research and advocacy activities to provide a strategic framework for activists, peacemakers and peacebuilders to work together to transform Jamaica.

“It is two parts. It is to build academic interest and [make] available, training, development and education in peace studies, so there is a lot of research that will go on in relation to building peace in Jamaica and reducing crime and violence at the undergraduate and graduate levels,” Ms. Hextall explains.

Over the past year, the IUC peace initiative has had a role in facilitating the training of educational and social development professionals in restorative justice theory, victim offender dialogue, and peace building.

Services offered by the IUC include training in mediation, cyberbullying prevention, and consultancy in design and implementation of conflict resolution, peacebuilding and peacemaking policies and procedures.