CKCPJ PEACE Leaders

Lexington United

Check it out! A new project by CKCPJ Peace Educator, Gail Koehler, called "Lexington United." After taking classes in Louisville at PeaceEd, Koehler and Sarabeth Brownrobie agreed to start up skills-based training for youth to equip peacemakers for our future. After editing CKCPJ’s Peaceways newsletter for more than 5 years, Koehler is eager to share every co-operative game she's learned. Brownrobie and Koehler are also joined in this effort by Tanya Torp, longtime community activist and founder of Be Bold. See more at their new website: http://www.lexingtoncommunitybuilding.org.

"We use games and hands-on experiences to explore the building blocks of conflict resolution: affirmation, cooperation and communication. We are also proponents of positive approaches to prejudice reduction and team building through cooperative games." If you know of a teen who would benefit from training in conflict resolution, prejudice reduction or team building games, call 859-474-0487 or email lexingtoncommunitybuilding@gmail.com.

Gail Koehler

Sarabeth Brownrobie

Tanya Torp

Funded in part by a grant from Partners for Youth in collaboration with Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government.

The Ideal Citizen

Today I attended a workshop that explains how the Project Citizen curriculum works - and how, if we start using it within our local communities and schools, it might improve Kentucky's "Civic Health Index."  Alison Lundergan Grimes, KY Secretary of State, is committed to raising the state's awareness of the need for more opportunities of high quality educational settings in which Kentuckians can learn the importance of good citizenship. As you can see in the list of dates on this press release, she plans to be at the University of Kentucky on March 20th, 10:30 a.m. (in the Cat's Den, Student Center - for directions, call 859.257.2017). Please make plans to attend! 

In the meantime, I wanted to share the following graphic depicting "The Ideal Citizen" that is part of the curriculum in Project Citizen - and it would appreciate your comments about it. Do you agree these are the key components/characteristics for "The Ideal Citizen" here in Central Kentucky? in the state? the U.S.? What do you think is missing from the graphic? How, if you were working with youth or your community group, would you define the "ideal" citizen?

 

Kingian Nonviolence Orientation, February 23

Please support University of KY Gaines Fellow, Dorneshia Thomas, in her juried project: "The University Application of Kingian Nonviolence" (for more information on this philosophy and strategy, see http://www.kingiannonviolence.info/publicationslinks.html ). Dorneshia asks that you plan to attend the orientation session she has organized for the morning of February 23rd - and a free lunch courtesy of the Provost!

Mr. Charles L. Alphin, Sr. of Atlanta is a trainer in Kingian Nonviolence and he will be speaking with us (UK administrators, faculty and students as well as members of the local community) from 9 am-noon. Please RSVP to dorneshia.thomas@uky.edu by noon on Wednesday, February 8th.

PEACE Leaders Education & Training: Nurturing Inner Peace and Healing Conflicts Using Mindfulness

Our next PEACE Leaders event is November 13th (1-5 pm) at the Mind and Body Studio (517A Southland Drive, Lexington, KY 40503) featuring Susmita Barua on cultivating inner peace and mindfulness as the first step to becoming a peace leader.  Please RSVP to Tanya.Torp@gmail.com.  Mita describes her workshop as follows:

The speediness of our high-tech society promotes stress, anxiety and passive aggression. We are continually starved for time and exposed to many sources of conflict within self, society and community. Some of us may feel high level of frustration and burnout from activism and peace work. Mindfulness helps us to sustain our inner capacity for sanity, self-care and compassion.

Mindful-awareness is more than simple meditation. It promotes deep healing, authentic presence and awakens natural wisdom and intelligence from within by synchronizing heart-mind and body. We will use some simple guided meditation to develop nondual awareness of breath, feeling and sensations. We will explore mindful communication, fear and fearlessness in dyads and small group exercises in a safe contained environment. We will share reflections and Q&A in open circle and collect feedbacks at the end. "We must be the change we want to see." - Gandhi.

If anyone would like to make a snack to bring, that would be appreciated. The suggested price is $15 but we won't turn anyone away if they do not have payment.  We have also extended an invitation to the Occupy Lexington folks to attend for free.  Janice Sevre-Duszynska will lead our next event.

PEACE Leaders Serve

We have some diverse and impactful ways for Peace Leaders to get involved and engage with our community.

Thursday, Oct 20 "Stand Down—Homeless Resource Fair" at the Central Christian Church (corner of MLK Blvd and Short St.) from 9 am - 2 pm.  Dozens of service providers serve hundreds of clients under one roof -- a unique event for Lexington.  The Veterans Administration is an anchor sponsor (http://www.lexington.va.gov/news/Oct2011StandDown.asp) -- CKCPJ provides morning hospitality and assists in service providers' lunch.  Our contact is Central Kentucky Council for Peace and Justice Board Member Billie Mallory at 859.285.5211.  Her recent essay connecting Human Rights and the issue of Homelessness can be found at   http://bit.ly/11Oct2011Homeless. 

Thursday the 27 Oct Kentucky Council of Churches 2011 Annual Assembly.  We will be tabling this event -- set up at 11:30 prior to lunch and then 1:30 workshops, on variety of topics:  addressing racism; improving outreach services to migrants; improving migrants’ access to legal services; connecting climate, food systems and migration; exploring immigration through documentaries.  Anyone tabling this event also has the opportunity to attend the workshops.

Dr. Kerby Neill is our contact for this event.  His email is above: tkneill@earthlink.net and his phone number is 859.293.2265.

Voices 2011 Series - http://www.peaceandjusticeky.org/Voices11.htm

We could use your enthusiasm to table at any of these events.  Training takes just a few moments and it is always fun getting to meet the people who support CKCPJ and the work that we do as well as serve our community.  Please contact me if you are interested in serving.

Tanya Torp Email: tanya.torp@gmail.com  Phone 859-684-8729

Saturday, October 22, 2011  10AM to Noon -  Juvenile Restorative Justice Forum.  Location: 163 West Short Street, 4th Floor  Two volunteers are needed for this opportunity.  One volunteers will write a short article for our PeaceWays Publication.  The second volunteer will prepare a 5 minute presentation to share with the CKCPJ Board on what was presented.  Please contact me if you are interested in serving.

Tanya Torp Email: tanya.torp@gmail.com  Phone 859-684-8729

EXCITING MOMENTUM

Finally, I would like to thank Michael Fogler and SusMita Barua for attending our last Peace Leaders Meeting on October 2, 2011.  They both expressed passion and zeal about some areas of the Peace Leaders Group we are about to launch.  SusMita will chair the Inner Peace Committee.  Before we can teach others about peace, we need to understand it within ourselves and how we interact with others.  

Michael Fogler will chair the Peace Studies and Conflict Resolution Committee.  This committee will focus on creating curriculum and facilitating opportunities to share peace and conflict resolution with children and students in schools.  We will train Peace Leaders to lead activities and teach children and young adults about peace and peaceful conflict resolution.  

There has also been an expressed interest in the economic issues surrounding war and the effect it has on poverty the world over.

If any or these areas is of interest to you, please contact me immediately to join the committee.

Our next Meeting:  

Date: November 13, 2011 
Time:  1PM to 5PM

Workshop: Developing Inner Peace in Times of Chaos

Cost: Sliding Scale Based on Ability to pay. No one will be turned away for not being able to contribute. Suggested Price: $15
Refreshments included however,please eat lunch before you arrive.
Location: To be determined.

PLEASE SAVE THE DATE!

 

Perennial Peace Garden event

Join us on September 6th at noon Eastern Time in the Perennial Peace Garden at the UKy Island in Second Life. This virtual world event will be taking place at the same time as the real life ceremony at the UK campus with food and good cheer for all.

So, if you're not a member of Second Life, come on down in person to the W.T. Young Library on the UK campus. Along with many other community organizations interested in peace and justice, the CKCPJ has been invited to attend the celebration for the implementation of the new UK general education called UK Core. The event will include music and other presentations by UK students and will end with a challenge from JJ Jackson, the UK V-P for Institutional Diversity, to react to the beautiful installation of Marjorie Guyon's Nation of Nations paintings.

Perennial Peace Garden at University of Kentucky

Jessica Anderson, a Gaines Fellow at the University of Kentucky, has created a Perennial Peace Garden in the social networking, virtual world of Second Life.  Located directly in the center of the University of Kentucky "island" and downhill from the virtual W.T. Young Library, the garden will serve as a place for personal reflection, small group discussion sessions and for international gatherings.  The virtual world environment allows for a wide range of opportunities for conversations with peace advocates from around the world, and the flexibility of the 3D environment allows for deep learning experiences gained by well designed roleplay and simulations.  Contact Randolph Hollingsworth or Arne Bathke, co-chairs of the CKCPJ Board (peaceandjusticeky@gmail.com), to find out more about this unique setting and to see how you can contribute to events planned around the use of the Perennial Peace Garden.