Youth for Peace, in cooperation with Peace Education Hub (Faculty of Philosophy, University of Sarajevo), held a workshop on peace education on May 16, 2023. This date is celebrated as the International Day of Living Together in Peace, so the event was an exceptional opportunity to celebrate this day and discuss how we can contribute together to peace through education. The workshop was held at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Sarajevo. Students from the Department of Pedagogy, Department of English, and Department of History attended the workshop. Facilitators from our organization, Emina Frljak and Azra Hodžić, designed and implemented the workshop. Support during the organization and implementation of the workshop on behalf of the Center for Peace Education was provided by Prof. Ph.D. Emina Dedić Bukvić from the Department of Pedagogy.
During the workshop, the participants, through interactive exercises, had the opportunity to learn what peace education is, its contents and types, and how to make their future classrooms and workplaces peace-sensitive. The methods used during the workshop relied on methods from the peace education oeuvre, where the emphasis was on the participants, their experiences, and ideas, which they could connect with new knowledge and skills in the field of peace education.
One of the workshop participants, Suzana Benković, shared with us that "peace education can be one of the initiators of changes in society, and changes in society are necessary for a society to progress. Today's workshop was precise that one, although perhaps a tiny, but no less significant change in the adoption, understanding, and later in the application of the learned knowledge through the prism of peace education".
"Having the opportunity to participate in today's workshop on peace education, I can freely say that in addition to the knowledge I had in this area so far, I also learned a lot of new things. I learned what is included in peace education and what are all the advantages of implementing peace education in schools. I also had the opportunity to learn about very interesting activities within the workshop, which I had not had the opportunity to learn about and participate in before. Our presenters, Azra and Emina, did an excellent job, and I am happy that we had the opportunity to learn from them," said Almir Bulbul, a student of pedagogy who participated in the workshop.
During the workshop, the participants showed interest in the topic, were actively involved in the conversation, connected new knowledge with their previous experiences, and presented ideas on how they, as future teachers and pedagogues, can improve the educational process and introduce methods and elements of peace education into their work. This workshop is the first joint activity that Youth for Peace and Peace Education Hub implemented together, and we hope that our cooperation in the field of peace education will continue in the future.
