Updated Septerber 5, 2008

Presidential Statement

     I want to share my excitement about the direction of the Education Section.   As an educator, my passion in the field of conflict resolution truly lies in peer mediation training and coaching students and staff to use appropriate conflict resolution skills.  The question is how do we accomplish this monumental task?  Some of the keys to educating students and educators include providing peer mediation training using the standards established by the Education Section, sharing research findings in the field of conflict education with schools, establishing more regional conferences, and encouraging youth participation and membership in the Education Section.  Accomplishing these goals will require a lot of hard work, but I believe we can rise to the challenge!

            The education section is hosting a variety of innovative presentations at the 8^th Annual ACR Conference in Austin Texas, September 24-27, 2008.

      My special thanks goes to our Peer Mediation Standards Committee and the work they accomplished on the Peer Mediation Standards.  Also, I must recognize Tahjae Gaynor and Ruth Lusby for their work on a successful Youth Day Conference in Phoenix.  I would like to personally thank Anne Smiley and Marsha Blakeway for their hard work in making the Fairfax Regional Conference in March 2008 a success. Last, but not least, I especially look forward to working with the Ed Heads this year and having many productive conversations through our monthly teleconferences.

     I would be remiss if I did not address some of the challenges facing our section.   These challenges include disseminating the peer mediation standards to schools and trainers throughout our nation and supporting the training of youth.  In addition, we must continue to encourage membership in our section.  Even though we face many obstacles, I believe the Education Section is on the verge of accomplishing some great achievements in the field of education and I am very privileged to be your chair.

Sincerely,

Cynthia Morton, Ed.S., LPC, NCC

8/5/07 Update

TO:  Education section members

New Education Section Award:

The ACR Education Section is planning on giving an annual award at the ACR conference during the presidential luncheon.  The award will be in honor of William J. Kreidler, who was an outstanding conflict

resolution educator. The award will be presented to a person who has given distinguished service in the field of conflict resolution education, thereby benefiting the organization. If you would like to nominate someone who you feel deserves this special acknowledgment, please send your nomination to Priscilla Prutzman (CCRCNYACK @aol.com) or to me (smiley_aw@yahoo.com) by August 15th.  Please include your thoughts about why you are making this nomination. 

Education Section Elections:

It is time again for us to elect a new person to serve in the position of Chair-Elect of the Education Section.  This person will serve a 3-year term, moving on to the positions of Chair and Immediate Past Chair.  The Education Section Chairs form a triumvirate with a past,

present, and incoming chair sharing the leadership responsibilities. These positions and responsibilities are described in Article II of our Organizing Document. Here’s the Nomination Form.

Also, if you are would be interested in participating in the section leadership committee, you are also more than welcome.  The "Ed Heads" meet once per month via phone meetings.  The section committees are also described in the Organizing Documentin Articles IV and V.

ACR Annual Conference in Phoenix:

Finally, we hope to see you in Phoenix for the annual conference from Oct 24-27th.  We will have a Youth Day on Friday, October 26 with secondary high school mediators descending among us for added diversity. 

Save the Date:  

Please put March 9-11, 2008 on your calendar for a regional ACR Education Section conference co-sponsored by Northern Virginia Student Mediation Conference and the Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution (ICAR) at George Mason University. If you can help with the planning (program and local planning)  please let me know. Stay posted for announcements about proposals.

Enjoy the rest of the summer that always goes too fast!!!

Thanks,

Anne Smiley

ACR Education Section Chair

E-mail address: smiley_aw@yahoo.com

July 25, 2007 UPDATE

Hello Education Section members!!!

NEWS AND EVENTS:

Hopefully, you are all aware of the recent developments for educators through ACR and other places. 

.     You should have received hard copies of "The 4th R" by now -

congratulations to Co-editors Robert Whipple and Jared Ordway for  bringing it back!!! Great Articles! 

.     Bill Warters and Trish Jones have collaborated with several organizations to bring www.creducation.orginto existence as an  incredible resource for all kinds of conflict resolution information.

.     The ACR 2007 annual conference in Phoenix is coming up at the end of October.  Hope you can join us there.

SAVE THE DATE - March 9-11, 2008: 

The main reason for this communication is another event that we are  very proud to be co-sponsoring. This past year there was an Inter-American  summit on conflict resolution in Cleveland with many ACR Education Section  members attending.  We liked it so much, we wanted It to happen again so that more educators had access to regional  conferences more directly related to educators. 

That being said, the ACR Education Section is collaborating with the Northern Virginia Student Mediation Conference (Fairfax County Public Schools) and the Institute for Conflict Resolution and Analysis (ICAR)  at George Mason University to co-sponsor a regional conflict resolution conference for educators and youth.  The conference will be held  Sunday, March 9 through Tuesday, March 11 2008 on the George Mason University  Campus in Fairfax, VA. Hotel accommodations will be arranged that are  accessible to campus.  

Preliminary ideas for the conference include the following:

.     a Sunday evening plenary event; 

.     workshops during all day Monday and Tuesday afternoon; and

.     participating in the Middle School Day of the

student conference with about 600 middle school mediators and their program coordinator on Tuesday morning.

HELP WANTED: If you are interested in helping to design the conference or to be on the local planning committee, we need your  help!

Please contact me - Anne Smiley (smiley_aw@yahoo.com) to sign up for  the program committee or Marsha Blakeway (mblakeway@igc.org) to sign up to be onthe local planning committee.

Also, we hope you will think about submitting a proposal for a workshop session for the conference - we'll let you know when and where to  submit proposals. 

Stay tuned!!!!

Anne Smiley

Education Section Chair