Summer Peacebuilding Program

The talk given to us by Mr. Willie Stokes was very powerful for me. To hear from a former gang leader about his life transformation was utterly inspiring for me. Often times, as part of the general public, we simply castigate gang members for the violence and destruction that they cause… and with good reason, […]

Looking retrospectively, I have had the honor of being lectured by some of the most competent, innovative and resilient minds in the field of peacebuilding and conflict-management. And, while I had enjoyed each and every single one of those, there was something very different, very peculiar about the lecture held by Willie R. Stokes that […]

As we started our journey home yesterday from the CeaseFire program info session in Oakland, I received a call from my brother who had just received some startling news: his best friend has been arrested and accused of driving drunk and fatally injuring a motorcyclist in southern California this past weekend. The unfortunate fact about […]

After the visit to Salinas Valley State Prison, I was overwhelmed by the number of prisoners affiliated with gang violence and I was sad to learn that most of these prisoner were probably unable to see life beyond gang memberships and violence as it’s a predominant part of their culture. Yesterday’s Mr. Willie Stokes’s testimony […]

After visiting the Salinas Police Department last week, I was eager to see the other sides of the criminal justice system and analyze the different factors that contributed to the massive incarcerated population in our country.  I expected there to be differences in the level of security, my general comfort level upon entering the area, […]

Last Tuesday, we visited the Salinas Valley State Prison and it was one of the greatest experiences of my life. Not because I felt joyful because there were plenty of people incarcerated there but because I learned so much from the experience. I have never been to a state prison, not even in my country. […]

One key lesson that I am getting from the experience thus far at the Summer Peacebuilding Program is that peace building is a form of art. It is not something that one can learn from by just going through articles and papers written by renowned scholars (although that provides a strong base). From our experience over […]

On Monday evening, Mr. Kazu Haga presented about the principles of East point peace academy. He is the founder of the East Point Peace Academy. He shared the principles that East Point promotes. During the session, we learned more about the history of Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream of “institutionalizing and internationalizing nonviolence”. This was […]

I was particularly struck by Dr. Susan Hirsch’s session on trauma in the peace building context, and it has reignited a burgeoning interest I have developed in trauma in the political context. Trauma is a universal and often life-changing experience. Many events or phenomena can be traumatising, often in different ways, and often to varying degrees. […]

I was thoroughly pleased after yesterday’s sessions on the roles of Trauma Healing and Nonviolence in the process of peace building, because these are two topics that I strongly resonate with. By emphasising the level of personal healing that must take place after communities of individuals are witnesses to – and perhaps also perpetrators of […]