During my morning reading/journaling session I was reflecting on a passage from Everything is Figureoutable with my mother-in-law. The chapter is about refusing to be refused and includes the incredible story of peace activist Leymah Gbowee. Basically, Leymah lead a women’s peace movement that brought an end to the second civil war in Liberia in 2003. Incredibly this paved way for the election of the first female head of state of Africa, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. She was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2011 along with fellow Nobel Laureate Sirleaf in recognition of their efforts to bring women into the peacekeeping process.
During this reflection I realized how little exposure to peace learning I’ve had through my educational journey. Don’t get me wrong, I feel it extremely important to be aware and knowledgeable of the world’s history of war. But shouldn’t PEACE teachings, initiatives, and experiences at least be intertwined into our history curricula, too? I don’t recall learning much, if anything, about Nobel Peace prize winners nor the peacekeeping process anywhere in the world.
I can’t help but wonder if other countries lack peace teaching, too? I certainly don’t think this is something limited to the United States public education system, but is it a worldwide issue? I can only think it must be! We NEED peace, peacekeeping tactics, peaceful communications, all over our world, why do we only learn about war?
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