Peace Players International is a group that has been using basketball to bring kids and coaches on both sides together. They have had good success both in NI and also in Israel. They are hosting an Anatomy of Peace Seminar by the Arbinger Institute in Belfast in April. I’ve been invited to attend and bring all of our NI adult volunteers who would like to attend, as well as Burim. So I am going to Belfast in April, and hopefully Burim will get his visa and be able to come as well. We will stay with the family I usually stay with, so our expenses will be low. I’ll go a week before the seminar to visit the centers who have hosted our programs in the past and get their staff interested in attending, and stay a week after to do followup with them. Burim and I will teach the training to the Kosovo Youth Volunteers this summer, and Burim will teach it to the Ugandan Youth Volunteers this fall.

I’m hoping we can build a partnership with Peace Players and with Arbinger. If you’ve ever read the book “The Anatomy of Peace” by the Arbinger Institute, you will know why this is such a perfect partnership for us. And I’m extremely excited about working peacebuilding training into our program. We do peacebuilding, of course (our biggest goal with the children is teaching tolerance) but we haven’t had a set curriculum until now. I want to learn what they are doing so well, and adapt it to our children.

I just spent one of the best weeks of my life at BYU Hawaii. What an amazing school, faculty and student body. They have students from over 70 countries, and their mission is not only education but peacebuilding throughout the world.

I was invited to speak at the all-student Devotional, but offered to also speak to or teach any classes that would like to have me. So I taught Leadership, Social Entrepreneurship, and Intro to Peacebuilding classes, and spoke to Student Government and Business Club meetings, as well as Music Theory, Choir, and General Music Classes. It was fantastic. No time for the beach, but lots of time for talking about SMF!

One of the best things about Hawaii is “talking story” (hanging out, telling stories). One night I was asked to speak to a church youth group, and after my presentation the youth leaders and I sat around talking for hours! Many evenings I had groups of students in my on-campus apartment, sitting on the floor just talking and talking. It was exhausting but so much fun!

One of the most amazing things about BYU Hawaii is that they have an International Peacebuilding Certificate Program, run by Chad Ford. Students learn about, commit to, and formulate working plans to be Peacebuilders now and after they return to their home country.

I’m hoping to get more involved with this Peacebuilding program in the coming years. We’ll see what happens!!