This past weekend I returned to Albany, NY to participate in my fifth consecutive Democracy Matters summit and it never ceases to be an educational and inspiring experience. A special part of this year’s summit was that DM’s president and founder, Adonal Foyle, was able to attend and give the keynote address.
The spring 2011 semester at American University has begin and my dad and I continue to teach EDU285 – Education for International Development. This semester marks the fourth time we’ve taught this course and we are continuing to find new ways to make the class better – introducing appropriate amounts of content, incorporating a diverse set of activities and exercises, and utilizing new online tools to enhance student learning. This semester there are three main changes from previous semesters: (1) a Twitter feed (@AUedu285) to follow stories related to education and international development, (2) a website redesign, and (3) more guest speakers.
I recently finished reading George Lakey’s new book, Facilitating Group Learning: Strategies for Success with Diverse Adult Learners. I thoroughly enjoyed this book because it provides a clear description and examples of what experiential education, or what Lakey calls direct education, is and entails. Having been an experiential educator for several years now, Lakey and his colleagues at Training for Change, have become a real source of learning for me and my work. Below are several key insights from the book:
This week I finished facilitating ICNC’s eight-week course, Civil Resistance and the Dynamics of Nonviolent, which is offered in partnership with the United States Institute of Peace. This is the second iteration of this course – by far the most popular fall 2010 course offered through USIP’s academy – and we’ve made some significant improvements from last time.
One of the best parts of my job is having the opportunity to meet amazing people who are on the front lines of nonviolent movements across the world. Earlier this year, I started an online initiative interviewing nonviolent action takers in order to share the stories, experiences, and perspectives of these individuals and their movements so that the rest of the world may be made aware of their struggle. In this interview I speak with Herman Wainggai, a leader in West Papua’s self-determination struggle.
Posted in Digital Strategy
Tagged activist, civil resistance, herman wainggai, indonesia, interview, nonviolence, nonviolent action, on the ground, west papua
This past weekend, I attended the Gandhi-King Conference on Peacemaking in Memphis, TN. This was the second time I have attended and presented at the conference and definitely plan on attending again next year. The conference brings together a great group of educators, activists, and organizers interested in various topics related to peace, conflict resolution, community organizing, and social justice. Download the full conference program here. This year I had a lot more time to meet and learn from all the other amazing participants since I was there for the whole event, as opposed to three years ago, when I missed half the conference because I got lost and ended up roaming the streets of Memphis for five hours.
This past Thursday I presented my very first webinar, The Digital Duel: Resistance and Repression in an Online World, which looked at the emerging role of digital tools, new media, and the Internet in waging nonviolent struggle across the world. It also looked at how repressive regimes are also using these same tools to censor and clamp down on dissent and civic mobilization.
Posted in Digital Strategy, Education/Training, Presentations
Tagged april 6 youth movement, burma, burma vj, clay shirky, colombia, cyber-pragmatism, democratic voice of burma, digital activism, digital media, dvb, egypt, evgeny morozov, facebook, farc, ICNC, international center on nonviolent conflict, internet, kefaya, mary joyce, myanmar, nonviolence, orange revolution, oscar morales, pora, sms, social media, twitter, ukraine, webinar, youtube
Learn-Serve students at the end of their weekend retreat
This weekend, three of my training colleagues and I went out to the For the Love of Children’s Outdoor Education Center in Harper’s Ferry, VA to facilitate a workshop on cross-cultural learning with students in the Learn-Serve International program. Learn-Serve brings together high school students from all over the Washington, DC area to work in teams throughout the year, developing and implementing a social entrepreneurship project that addresses a need in their community.
Posted in Education/Training
Me and Colman McCarthy at the El-Hibri Foundation
Last night, my wife, Alyson and I attended a peace education award ceremony honoring Colman McCarthy – one of the most dedicated and committed peace educators I have ever met. The Ibrahim El-Hibri Foundation presents this award annually to a influential peace educator. Past winners have been Dr. Mary Elizabeth King, Dr. Abdul Aziz Said, and Scott Kennedy.
Working with students during my presentation
Today, I gave a presentation on nonviolent civic action to 300 8th graders at Alice Deal Middle School in Washington, DC. I was invited by one of the school’s teachers, Terrence Ngwa, who was also a participant in my peace education class during the summer of 2009. This was really fun experience, not only because I got to catch up with Terrence, but I also got to meet a lot of amazing students at Alice Deal and some other presenters doing excellent work in the fields of peace, conflict resolution, human rights, and diversity training.
My presentation broke the students up into four different groups. Students in each group were asked to partner up with the person next to them to talk about their understanding of different concepts related to nonviolent civic action. The first group looked at “human rights,” the second group looked at “conflict,” the third group looked at “resistance,” and the fourth group looked at “power.” After everyone was given at least 5 minutes to discuss, I asked a few of the students to come up to the front and present their definition/understanding of these concepts. As they presented I wrote down their ideas on a piece of flip chart paper.
Posted in Presentations
Daryn R. Cambridge 