Type of Organization(s) [government or non-government organizations such as universities]:
Non-Government
Organization Contact Information:
Active Non-violence and Peace Education Programme West Africa Network for Peacebuilding Regional Office
P.O. Box CT 4434
Cantonment-Accra
Ghana
E-mail: Laddae-mensah@wanep.org
Contact Person(s):
Levinia-Addae-Mensah, Regional Program Coordinator
Summary
WANEP works with students, teachers and parents in schools throughout Liberia, Ghana, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Togo and Senegal in an attempt to confront the growing threat of violence which is fast eroding cultures and values in West Africa. The organization began an Active Non-violence and Peace Education Programme in August 2000, working to introduce a new curriculum, sourcebook and teacher's guide to be used in schools in West Africa. The ultimate objective is the integration into national education systems throughout West Africa.
Description of Organization’s Work in CRE
WANEP as a regional organization at the West African level has been working in seven countries in the sub-region to promote conflict resolution programmes in schools. Briefly, the programme has run at two levels within the formal sector:
i) Development of peace education tools (teachers guide and source book)
ii) Development of peer mediation programmes in schools.
At both levels, teachers and students were trained and students have gone ahead to form peace clubs within which mediation of school-based programmes by trained student mediators take place.
Legislation and Policy Initiatives
There have been initiatives moving towards policy direction and some of these initiatives have included active involvement of government agencies, such as WANEP's work which has engaged Ministries of Education in Ghana, Liberia, Cote D'Ivoire, Guinea and Sierra Leone. Part of the results of this engagement has been the revision of the syllabus in Ghana to include aspects of peace education in five subject areas. In the other countries, the ministries of education are engaging in preparing the ground for a more comprehensive approach to conflict resolution in schools.
Resources
The Active Non-violence and Peace Education Programme constitutes the second largest substantive project component of the CPP. It grew out of a series of ad-hoc training workshops prior to 2001 when the CPP was conceptualized, with the objective to systemize peace work aimed at children and youth, both as victims of violent conflicts in the sub-region and as perpetrators. Despite the fact that it was conceived as a 'pilot' project, the scale of its implementation was extremely ambitious, involving setting up and supporting simultaneously curricular as well as extra-curricular activities in seven countries (four Anglophone - Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone - and three Francophone - Côte d'Ivoire, Togo and Guinea), with an average of 12 participating schools in each country. The curricular activities consist in the introduction of peace education themes into the formal school curriculum, either as a separate subject or as part of an already existing one, while the extra-curricular activity focuses on what is known as 'peer mediation'. Both activities include training of teachers and pupils, the elaboration of corresponding training materials, and the implementation itself. In many cases, the activities with and by teachers and pupils have become intertwined, with the establishment of so-called 'peace clubs' in schools, groups of actively engaged pupils who organise specific campaigns and events.
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