MU Gets a Lesson in Conflict Resolution
BY MADELYN PENNINO
Intelligencer Journal Staff
Tony Gallagher grew up in Northern Ireland in a time when people died because of their religious beliefs.
Despite witnessing decades of political turmoil and violence, Gallagher, the education supervisor at Queen’s University Belfast in Belfast, Northern Ireland, remains an optimist — especially when it comes to the job of integrating schools there.
Gallagher, an expert in conflict resolution, is visiting Millersville University to talk with students and staff about his effort to integrate Protestant and Catholic schools.
In 2007, Gallagher formed the Sharing Education Program through Atlantic Philanthropies, a U.S.-based organization that seeks to bring lasting change to disadvantaged and vulnerable people around the world.
Gallagher said the focus of the program is for students of all ages to reach a point of understanding at which they can talk about their differences.
It’s not an attempt to take away anyone’s cultural or religious identity, he said.
“I don’t want to neutralize the space. I want students to recognize each other’s differences and celebrate it,” Gallagher said. “There is no language of the common good right now. That restricts people’s ability to understand each other and build a common society.”
Two years ago, Gallagher received $12 million from Atlantic Philanthropies to form a federation of more than 60 schools that agreed to be integrated as part of Gallagher’s project.
So far, 2,500 students have been integrated, Gallagher said.
The project includes educators going to primary and secondary schools to train instructors to use conflict-resolution skills and turn a negative discussion or situation into an opportunity for conversation.
While conflicts have risen at some of the integrated schools, Gallagher said, teachers have learned to resolve tension through discussion.
“Students are now exploring their prejudices,” Gallagher said.
While the schools have been integrated for just 18 months, Gallagher said there has been significant progress.
He spoke of one girls’ school in Northern Ireland that was particularly reluctant to integrate but has had much success.
“They text each other and meet in center city on the weekends,” Gallagher said.
The reason there are so many different perceptions among Protestants and Catholics, he said, is that they intentionally keep themselves isolated.
Gallagher said about 95 percent of the city’s neighborhoods are segregated.
“Communities don’t talk about their differences. They are governed by a sense of fear,” Gallagher said. “There is silence, so problems stay there.”
This is Gallagher’s first trip to Millersville University. While it’s a short one — he arrived Saturday and will leave Wednesday –– he’s talking to faculty members about the possibility of forming an exchange program between MU and Queen’s University Belfast through which students can learn more about diversity in education.
A published author, Gallagher in 2004 wrote “Education in Divided Societies,” a book that’s widely used among experts on conflict resolution.
Dominic Scott, an MU professor who teaches fundamentals in education, said he’s taken students to Northern Ireland in the past to study the peace movement there.
Scott said he has seen an increase in the number of students of Irish decent who want to travel to Ireland.
“There is a cultural and historical link that is lost here,” Scott said. “I want to rekindle that connection.”
Jane Bray, MU’s dean of the School of Education, said she believes Gallagher’s work is relevant to an MU student’s general curriculum. She said she looks forward to building a partnership with Gallagher and Queen’s University Belfast.
“It’s good not only for an education students but all students to expand their global opportunities,” Bray said. “When you drill that down for education students, it’s a significant opportunity for them to talk about conflict resolution in preparing teachers for the classroom.”
Gallagher has received another $12 million to continue his work of integration for at least the next three years.
His hope is that through this project methods for student integration can be established and used as models for conflict resolution in Northern Ireland.
“I think it can be done,” Gallagher said.
E-mail: mpennino@lnpnews.com |
