Certificate in
CONTACT: Conflict Transformation Across Cultures

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Examine key concepts in peacebuilding and learn how to apply effective conflict transformation practices.

At a Glance

For programs beginning in 2024

Next program will run in the summer of 2024

Critical Global Issue of Study

Peace & Justice

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The CONTACT program is currently being reorganized as we refocus our mission and take on new partners. It will not be offered in 2023. Expect information about our revised 2024 program to appear on this page in the coming months.

WHY A GRADUATE CERTIFICATE IN PEACEBUILDING AND CONFLICT TRANSFORMATION?

Attain invaluable, mission-critical skills to tackle urgent issues and build peace, both at home and abroad, in this world-renowned, professional and academic training program.

The underlying philosophy of this SIT Graduate summer program is that conflict transformation training and peacebuilding is most effective when it combines skills-based academic instruction with personal interaction between individuals across ideological, cultural, national, religious, and other divides.

Begin this two-week workshop by meeting your cohort on SIT’s idyllic campus in Vermont’s Green Mountains. Led by a diverse group of acclaimed faculty members with deep, applied classroom and research experience in peacebuilding and conflict management, you will learn about core ideas and effective practices of conflict transformation.

Over the course of your training, you and your fellow CONTACT participants will learn from one another and your instructors, following an intensive format based on SIT’s powerful experiential learning model.

By the end of the program, participants will have gained a mastery of conflict analysis; social identity and conflict; peacebuilding interventions; post-conflict reconciliation; intercultural communications; gender and peacebuilding; mediation; negotiation; dialogue; policy advocacy; and nonviolent social action.

Program Sites

Summer residency in Brattleboro, Vermont

Please note that in order to take advantage of dynamic learning opportunities, program excursions may occasionally vary.

Academics

Coursework

With SIT’s experiential curriculum, you’ll learn how to put theory into practice. In addition to participating in professional trainings and workshops, you will focus on core topic areas that will allow you to develop skills to create peace in your own relationships, as well as in your community and beyond. 

Upon completion of the CONTACT Certificate program, students will have:

  • Developed knowledge, skills, and awareness around key concepts in peacebuilding and community development
  • Gained knowledge of foundational theories related to peace and violence, intercultural exchange, identity formation, conflict transformation, reconciliation processes, restorative practice, and non-violent social action
  • Built skills in areas such as dialogue, mediation, negotiation, training, and facilitation for peace education
  • Nurtured awareness of how personal and social identities impact conflicts and peacebuilding practices
  • Fostered attitudes of courage, curiosity, re–humanization, intercultural understanding, and inclusion

 


Please expand the sections below to see detailed course information.


This is SIT

  • We value active togetherness, reciprocity, and respect as the essential ingredients for building a sustainable community.
  • With open minds, empathy, and courage, we facilitate intercultural understanding and respect for the commonalities and differences between people.
  • We champion social inclusion & justice in all that we are and all that we do, from ensuring our community and our programs amplify the voices, agency, and dignity of all people to deliberately instilling the principles and practices of inclusion in all of our work.
  • We are committed to human and environmental well-being through sustainability and contributing to a better world for all living and future generations.

For-Credit Option

You may, for an additional cost, take the CONTACT program for two graduate credits. If you choose this option, you will complete additional work, such as a journal or a research paper. 

Faculty & Staff

CONTACT

Bruce W. Dayton, PhD
Chair and Associate Professor, MA in Diplomacy and International Relations • Chair and Associate Professor, MA in Intercultural Service, Leadership, and Management • Associate Professor, MA in International Education • Associate Professor, MA in Sustainable Development Practice • Director, Certificate in Conflict Transformation Across Cultures (CONTACT)

Accommodations

Brattleboro, Vermont

Vermont is at the forefront of sustainability, education, and regeneration. New England is a haven for start-ups, transition towns, community-owned forests, artisanal food and beverage companies, sustainable farming, eco-architecture, green energy, and many environmental and social-justice organizations. SIT’s idyllic southern Vermont campus offers woodland trails, hiking, running, and cycling, as well as a private library, café, study rooms with mountain views, and an entertainment space where students often gather at the end of the day to socialize. You will also be a few miles from Brattleboro’s downtown, where you will be able to enjoy an array of shops, restaurants, and eateries. 

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