Peace Education in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa:
In partnership with the United States Institute for Peace (USIP) PEAD worked on a project “Peace Education in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa” in 36 government high & higher secondary schools in the districts Peshawar, Nowshera and Charsadda, of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
The programme was designed to:
- sensitize students and teachers on the importance of their role as peace promoters
- equip students and teachers with knowledge & skills for conflict prevention/management
Through the programme the dialogue on peaceful co-existence in the wider community were promoted. - It was also aimed at providing the target groups an alternative view of individual as well as collective responsibilities by way of directly engaging them in the program activities.
- The project aimed to help the target beneficiaries develop skills, knowledge and constructive attitudes in order to minimize conflict and to learn coexistence and peaceful conflict management.
Training Manuals:
Teachers Manual
Students Manual
Conceptual Manual
Further details available at www.usip.org
Creating Awareness of Rights and Responsibilties in Youth:
The Project Creating Awareness of Rights and Responsibilities in Youth (CARRY) was designed to enhance civic knowledge of students so that they participate in public affairs. The aim was to empower youth by preparing, motivating & engaging them to participate in civic life actively. The project also aimed to instill a sense of responsibility and accountability in youth towards environment and sensitizing them on the need to be careful about nature and the preservation of the natural resources.
To this idea, PEAD Foundation partnered with Hanns Seidel Foundation, Munich Germany since 2007 in carrying out the civic education programme. In 2009, the programme “Creating Awareness of Rights & Responsibilities (CARRY) in Youth” was introduced in some of the socio-economically challenged districts of the North Western Frontier Province (NWFP). 22 government high and higher secondary schools from districts Charsadda, Nowshera, Peshawar and Mardan were selected for the project.
8 modules were specifically prepared by experts in the field keeping in view the cultural and religious sensitivities of the local populations. Through these modules, basic knowledge and understanding of the working of the government and the political processes, which includes voting, party membership, issue organization at the grassroots level, policymaking, accountability and good governance- are discussed with youth in interactive sessions.
PEAD believes that citizens must recognize their rights and responsibilities in order to participate in the civic life. Therefore, our Civic Education Experts provided support to the youth groups to make sure that the local institutions and concerned officials were informed about issues that the citizens face in their daily life as well as held them accountable by organizing public meetings, rallies, community meetings, writing letters to the editors/officials, organizing walks etc.
Our civic education programme had directly trained nearly 62 master trainers and nearly 750 students as “social mobilizers”. Indirectly the programme reached over 30,000 students in districts Peshawar, Charsadda, Nowshera and Mardan.
Life Skill Based Education (LSBE):
The Life Skill Based Education (LSBE) Programme was specifically designed for adolescents to help them deal with social, political, psychological and physiological changes taking place in their lives. The main objective of the programme was to sensitize these adolescents about their sexual & reproduction health rights (SRHR). For this project, the target areas were government schools in rural to semi urban localities in district Nowshera. It is highly unlikely that adolescent in these areas get an opportunity to discuss their issues or concerns freely in their homes and schools.
The LSBE programe was very consciously introduced in the district bearing in mind the conservative social environment and rigid cultural norms prevailing in the area so that knowledge, skills and attitude necessary to make culturally appropriate safe choices about sexuality by adapting responsible behaviors can be provided.
The programme was implemented in 20 government high schools in district Nowshera with technical support from World Population Foundation (WPF). Peace Education and Development (PEAD) Foundation was one of the partners to implement and take forward this programme in the district Nowshera in 20 Government Schools. The programme directly reached out to nearly 4000 young boys and girls in the district. Visit www.wpfpak.org for details.
Environmental Awareness & Education Programme:
In partnership with Hanns Seidel Foundation, Germany the Environmental Awareness and Education Programme was run in 40 public high/higher secondary schools in districts Peshawar, Nowshera & Charsadda of the NWFP during 2007 & 2008.
Selected students from each school were trained in knowledge and skills to promote environmental conservation and preservation as a collective responsibility. Information booklets on various environmental themes were prepared and distributed among the students. The students were also provided action plans for larger dissemination.
Peace & Conflict Management:
Since 2003, PEAD has an ongoing program for sensitization & training of teachers on “peace and conflict management”. These trainings are aimed at enabling the participants to understand the dynamics of conflict and empower them with skills to deal with conflicts in their daily lives. The trained teachers in turn train their respective students on the concept of peace and skills of conflict handling. A teachers’ training manual titled “First Step Towards Peace” was specifically prepared to be used in the classrooms as extra-curricular material.
These capacity building trainings were initially carried out in collaboration with the District Government, Rawalpindi (Punjab) for several hundred public school teachers during 2004-2005.
In collaboration with the Friedrich Naumann Stiftung, Germany, similar capacity building workshops were organized in all four provinces. Schoolteachers, students, civil-society representatives, government officials, religious groups and media attended these workshops during 2003-2007.
Theatre For Peace:
PEAD's educational theatre "Religion of Peace" has performed in over 30 cities of NWFP, Punjab and Azad Kashmir during 2007& 2008.
The theatre was based on human rights issues and in particular the rights of the vulnerable groups in Pakistani society i.e. women, children and minorities.
The interactive theatre performances were held in public middle & high schools The play was also aired by a private cable network in Azad Kashmir and was very well received.
Over 50,000 participants (school students, teachers, community members and media representatives) attended these theatre performances.
Interfaith-Harmony & Peace Bulding:
In collaboration with several Pakistan based organizations PEAD has been working on promoting “Interfaith Harmony and Peace Building”.
During the trainings people from various religious backgrounds were brought together and sensitized with the concepts of tolerance, accommodation, socio-cultural and religious diversity in a society. Lectures on the subject in different parts of the country were also part of the PEAD program.